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After more than a year of blockage, the detailed provisions in the latest deal reached by negotiators from Sudan and South Sudan mean oil could start to flow again within weeks. The deal was reached in the early hours of 12 March after almost a week of talks in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. An implementation schedule has been agreed by the two sides that demands a resumption in oil production be mandated by the two governments by 24 March. South Sudan halted oil exports via Sudan in January 2012, after the Khartoum government began to confiscate South Sudanese oil as payment for what it claimed were unpaid transit fees.

The Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) joint venture has completed the sale of its 45% stakes in onshore blocks OML 29, 24 and 18 to Nigerian companies. The OML 29 stake and the 100km Nembe Creek trunk line were sold to Aiteo Eastern E&P, while Newcross Exploration and Production bought a stake in OML 24, in the eastern Niger Delta, in November. Eroton Exploration and Production Company, a special-purpose vehicle owned by Mart Resources, Midwestern Oil and Gas and Suntrust Oil, bought the JV’s interests in OML 18.

AFRICA OIL: Newcomer plans IPO on newcomer Plus market; CANDAX: Non-exec chairman; GEOGLOBAL: Egyptian block rights handed over in India play

Seplat Petroleum Development Company has acquired stakes in two Niger Delta licences sold by Chevron Nigeria. The company, which raised $500m with a share listing in London and Lagos last year and is also considering a bid for Afren (AE 292/19), has completed the acquisition of a 40% stake in OML 53, as well as indirectly buying 22.5% in OML 55. Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation has 60% in both blocks. Seplat will acquire the OML 55 stake by buying 56.25% of Belemaoil Producing Limited, a special purpose vehicle that has completed the acquisition of 40% in the licence from Chevron.

Songas and the Energy and Water Utilities Regulatory Authority (Ewura) have approved a tariff methodology for the proposed doubling of Songo Songo output to 140mcf/d. An Ewura spokesman told African Energy the methodology, accounting for Songas’ operation and maintenance expenditure and taxes among other costs, will provide the framework on which Ewura’s tariff offer for Songas’ increased output will be based.

Total has given Technip an engineering, procurement and supply contract for the offshore Moho Nord project. Moho Nord consists of two developments: Moho Phase 1bis and Moho Nord, and this contract is part of the Moho Phase 1bis development, which consists of tiebacks to the existing deep-water Alima floating production unit and the shallow-water N’Kossa platform.

Total has received government approval for the acquisition of a 50% stake in Block 11B/12B from Canadian Natural Resources. Total takes over as operator and will drill a well in 2014. The block is located in the Outeniqua Basin, around 175km off the southern coast, and covers an area of 19,000km2 in water depths ranging from 200 to 1,800 metres. Conditions in the area are challenging and CNR had been looking for a partner ahead of planned drilling.

Savannah Petroleum announced on 15 March that it has signed a letter of award with Great Wall Drilling Company for GWDC rig 89. The letter provides for a programme of three firm wells, and includes options for a further six wells. The rig is in Niger, and drilling is expected to start during H1 2017. Savannah has issued purchase orders for long-lead items including casing and wellheads.

Following its recent farm-out in Morocco, Pura Vida Energy is seeking a partner for the offshore Nkembe Block. The Australian company, which acquired 80% in the block in January, said it was interpreting existing 3D seismic data and expected to release resource estimates in July. In August, it will open a data room with the aim of finding a partner to fund new 3D seismic acquisition and drilling.

Total E&P Angola has given Fugro a three-year survey contract worth $26m to provide offshore positioning services and accurate navigation systems for Total E&P Angola’s drilling units, vessels and structures, together with onshore and offshore survey services. Fugro said the contract was a continuation of services supplied to Total E&P Angola under a similar contract since 2008.

Bowleven on 11 May announced the arrival of the Topaz Driller rig in Cameroonian waters from Singapore for a two-well appraisal drilling campaign on the Etinde licence for operator New Age (African Global Energy). The IM-6 well is expected to spud at the end of May to test the potential of the Intra Isongo play opened by the IM-5 well in 2012. The Topaz Driller has been contracted for 150 days.

RakGas has advertised for a consultant to carry out geological mapping of blocks 4 and 5. The consultant will conduct a detailed site mapping of rock and sedimentary outcrops and their structures using various technical inputs. The work is expected to take two months from contract signing. A tender notice was published in Malawi’s The Nation on 15 July, and bids were due by 19 July. Block 4 covers the southern half of Lake Malawi, including part of Lake Malawi National Park, one of Malawi’s two UN World Heritage Sites, while Block 5 includes Lake Malombe and Lake Chilwa.

Following the departure of Murphy Oil, Sweden’s PA Resources has won a farm-in from SOCO International for the Mer Profonde Sud exploration permit. SOCO will take a 60% operating stake and will drill an exploration well in 2014 or 2015. The exploration permit excludes the Azurite field, which Murphy is in the process of abandoning, having announced in August that the field had reached its economic limit (AE 264/9). PA Resources had been keen to secure a new partner after Murphy pulled out, arguing that the rest of the block had further exploration potential.


Gabon has replaced its oil minister as part of a larger cabinet shuffle. Pascal Houangni Ambouroué, previously deputy economy minister, will replace Etienne Dieudonne Ngoubou, who was appointed in January 2014. Ambouroué was the youngest minister in the government when he was appointed to the cabinet in October 2016, aged 40. Before that, he spent a decade in international finance, including stints with BNP Paribas, Natexis and Crédit Agricole. He then joined the central African stock exchange, the Bourse des Valeurs Mobilières d’Afrique Centrale, where he became director-general in January 2012.

On 8 October in London, BP group chief executive Bob Dudley, Eni chief executive Claudio Descalzi and National Oil Corporation (NOC) chairman Mustafa Sanalla signed a letter of intent paving the way for Eni’s purchase of a 42.5% interest in BP’s exploration and production-sharing agreement (EPSA). The EPSA includes three contract areas, two in the onshore Ghadames Basin and one in the offshore Sirte Basin, covering a total area of around 54,000km2.