Page 8 - AfrOil Week 18 2021

AfrOil PIPELINES & TRANSPORT AfrOil

The Ugandan government is taking steps to truck drivers to transport goods, materials and
ensure that some of these contracts go to local service workers.
companies, Aheebwa stressed. For example, she Laura Valetine Ukarimu, the head of the
said, Kampala has decreed that contracts for cer- youth training programme, which focuses on
tain types of services, including but not limited sustainable tourism, said at the event that she
to logistics, must be awarded to Ugandan firms. expected the oil projects to lend a certain amount
It is also requiring foreign service providers to of momentum to Uganda’s tourism sector. Plans
assign some project works to local companies, for the development of Kingfisher and Tilenga
she added. have created incentives for the construction of
These ring-fenced provisions will help Ugan- new infrastructure facilities that can serve both
dan businesses expand their capacity for provid- tourists and oil workers, she explained.
ing support to oil and gas projects, she said. In “[The] government has built about 500 km of
turn, she added, local companies will be able to roads and an international airport in the [Lake
create jobs. In the logistics sector alone, she said, Albert] region, so tourists will find it easy to
Ugandan firms will probably need to hire about travel both [by] air and road,” she remarked. “So
900 machine operators and more than 2,700 marketing should be key for tour operators.” ™

INVESTMENT
FAR shareholders approve sale of

Sangomar stake to Woodside

SENEGAL AUSTRALIA’S FAR Ltd has secured its share-
holders’ approval for its planned sale of a minor-
ity stake in Sangomar, an oil-bearing block
located offshore Senegal, to Woodside Energy,
also based in Australia.
According to a company statement, share-
holders voted overwhelmingly in favour of
the plan at their rescheduled general meeting,
which took place on April 28. Some 97.25% of
all ballots submitted were for the sale, while only
2.75% were against, the statement said.
The deal will further increase Woodside’s
stake in RSSD, the joint venture set up to develop
the Sangomar block. The company is already
serving as operator of the project.
The results of the vote clear the way for FAR
to move ahead with the transaction, in line with
the terms of the sales and purchase agreement
(SPA) it signed with Woodside in January of this
year.
The SPA calls for the latter company to pay
$45mn for the stake and to reimburse FAR’s
share of working capital in the project, includ-
ing cash calls, for the period between January 1,
2020 and the date the transaction is concluded. The Sangomar offshore block holds about 645mn boe (Image: Cairn Energy)
(It also gives FAR the right to collect certain con-
tingent payments in the future.) Woodside became the majority shareholder
These are the same terms that India’s in Sangomar last year, after Cairn Energy (UK)
ONGC Videsh Vankorneft had offered to pay announced plans to sell its 35% stake to Russia’s
for the asset in question, which consists of a Lukoil. It pre-empted that deal, thereby bringing
13.67% stake in the Sangomar Offshore oilfield its holdings up from 35% to 75%.
and a 15% stake in the other two sections of That figure is now slated to rise to about 90%
RSSD’s licence area, last November. Woodside as a result of the deal with FAR, and the remain-
announced in December that it intended to ing 10% of equity in the project will remain in
exercise its right, as operator of the Sangomar the hands of Senegal’s national oil company
project, to pre-empt that deal. (NOC), Petrosen.

P8 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 18 05•May•2021