Page 10 - AfrOil Week 41 2022

AfrOil INVESTMENT AfrOil

“Following the failure to bring the field into full
production [in 2018], the Atala field licence
was then revoked and returned to the basket as
approved by His Excellency, President Muham-
madu Buhari. Over a year after the licence was
revoked by the NUPRC, Halkin legally applied
and was duly awarded the OML 46 to operate,
on the condition that Halkin will bring the field
into full production. When there were petitions
to Halkin being awarded the licence, Halkin was
cleared by NUPRC after a thorough investiga-
tion of Halkin’s application process,” he stated.
Since then, Amusa-Eke said, HEPL has
upheld the conditions of its contract. Within
the first year after taking control of Atala, it put
more than 100 Nigerian employees to work at Halkin’s licence for the Atala oilfield was revoked in 2020 (Image: DPR)
the field and started investing millions of dollars
there. So far, he added, it has spent $30mn on 1,500 barrels per day (bpd) early in 2023, and
the project. the company intends to drill more wells there,
HEPL is now on track to launch full explora- Amusa-Eke said.
tion and production operations at the marginal The Nigerian government should offer more
field in the first quarter of 2023, he added. Atala tax breaks to companies that seek to develop
is expected come onstream at an initial rate of marginal fields, he commented. ™

POLICY
Turkish gas exploration deal in Libyan

waters “illegal,” charge Egypt and Greece

EGYPT/LIBYA EGYPT and Greece have denounced a deal
between Turkey and Libya allowing Ankara to
explore for natural gas in Libya’s section of the
Mediterranean Sea. The agreement is illegal and
will be opposed by all means, they said in a joint
statement on October 9.
Following a meeting with Egyptian Foreign
Minister Sameh Shoukry, Greek Foreign Min-
ister Nikos Dendias said that the agreement
threatens stability and security in the Mediter-
ranean, charging that the Libyan authority in
Tripoli does not have the necessary sovereignty
over the area as their mandate has expired and
its government does not have the legitimacy to
sign agreements.
Last week, Tripoli-based Libya’s Government
of National Unity (GNU) and Turkey signed
preliminary agreements to boost cooperation
between the two countries that included poten- Turkey and Libya signed a maritime border agreement in 2019 (Image: MFA.gov.tr)
tial energy exploration in maritime areas. The
Benghazi parliament also said the agreements Libya and Turkey agreed earlier in 2019 to
are illegal, as they were signed by a government establish an economic zone sharing a maritime
that had no mandate. border, but the move angered gas producers
Hours after the maritime border deal was Greece, Cyprus, Egypt and Israel, which held
announced, both Egypt and Greece challenged that the deal violates their economic rights in
its legitimacy. Libya’s Tripoli-based PM Abdul- an area suspected to contain vast natural gas
hamid Dbeibah commented that he was not reserves. That deal led Turkey to claim large
concerned with the positions of other states on areas of the eastern Mediterranean, angering
the deal. France and its EU partners.

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