Search results

In his first news conference on 25 August, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed confirmed significant problems with the 6.45GW Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (Gerd) on the Blue Nile River. But rather than address the lengthy ongoing spat with Cairo over the $4bn project, or chief engineer Semegnew Bekele’s death in central Addis Ababa in a mysterious 26 July shooting, Abiy’s comments shed more light on a distinctly domestic dispute.He blamed military-linked state contractor Metals and Engineering Corporation (Metec) for the delays.

The board of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) met in Lusaka on 25-26 October to discuss drafting the new EITI standard, which would widen the scope of disclosure requirements.

The 12 January confirmation of Daniel Yengo Massampu as Société Nationale d’Electricité’s chief executive keeps a professional at the operational helm of Democratic Republic of Congo’s power sector during a difficult period

Sustainable Energy For All (SE4All), the ambitious programme launched by UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon to bring 1bn people out of energy poverty by 2030, is gathering momentum, with the promise of focused and co-ordinated projects in key target countries and a welter of consultancy and development contracts financed by potentially dozens of different agencies. Ban remains a driving figure; he has nominated a special representative, Sierra Leonean diplomat Kandeh Yumkella, and brought prominent individuals and institutions together to champion the agenda. Structures are now being put in place to implement SE4All’s aims; they could have a radical impact on how many countries in sub-Saharan Africa structure their energy policy and deal flow.

Plans by Kosmos Energy and partner Cairn Energy to drill a well next year in a Moroccan-licensed block in the Western Sahara continue to provoke intense interest among oil companies excited by the disputed territory’s offshore potential, as well as political debate among the traditional protagonists. The territory is Moroccan-controlled, but officially under United Nations mandate, and debate centres on a legal opinion issued by UN general counsel Hans Corell in 2002, which stated that exploration and extraction of mineral resources in Western Sahara would be illegal “only if conducted in disregard of the needs and interests of the people of that territory”. This has allowed Morocco’s Office Cherifien des Phosphates to maintain output from its Phosboucraa subsidiary, which is a major employer in the region. However, the Corell judgment – which one official told African Energy, “we’ve all been re-reading recently” – has been generally interpreted as excluding new E&P work.

Despite his incapacities, President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, with his Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal, has spent recent weeks giving the impression of action at the top. New senior management is bedding in at national oil company Sonatrach, and military promotions on independence day, 5 July, signalled business as usual, even if there is still no movement on the retirement of key players such as military intelligence chief General Mohamed ‘Tewfik’ Mediene and chief of staff and deputy defence minister Lieutenant-General Ahmed Gaïd Salah.

NOC’s push to get international operators to do work and employ locally makes political sense to Tripoli, but localisation measures are adding to the pressure on foreign partners

Residents of Jakheira – a desert community 300km south of Benghazi – blockaded Wintershall’s oil fields in the Sirte Basin on 1 November, shutting in approximately 50,000 b/d of oil from the As-Sarah field that is normally exported from the Zueitina terminal. Following failed attempts by National Oil Corporation (NOC) to lift the blockade, community leaders have threatened to extend the blockade to other major fields such as Arabian Gulf Oil Company’s Nafoora. The dispute threatens to upset the already fragile relations between Wintershall and NOC.

An announcement by finance minister Margaret Mwanakatwe on 6 July that the government had completed a three-week investigation into its debt sustainability and “we know what debt we have and also we have shared the facts and figures with the [International Monetary Fund] IMF” illustrates how perilous its debt situation has become. A combination of inept governance and ugly politics means that President Edgar Lungu’s administration has lost credibility to the point that investors are sceptical of both its figures – the government claims to have $9.3bn of external debt – and its ability to get control of its finances.

New petroleum, energy and renewable energy minister Abdourahmane Cissé’s approval of plans for Paris-based investment company Eranove Group to build a 390MW gas-fired power plant at Jacqueville, near Abidjan, and for Globeleq’s 430MW Azito plant to add another 253MW in a CFA225.8bn ($385m) revamp suggests an acceleration of efforts to have 4GW of installed capacity in place by the time Côte d’Ivoire goes to the polls in 2020.

In one of his final acts in office, on 13 January, Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama issued an Executive Order authorising “expanded trade with and investment in Sudan” for a six-month period. Under the order, sanctions would be lifted indefinitely from 13 July without the intervention of the incoming president. Obama’s order authorised US persons “to engage in transactions involving persons in Sudan; to import goods and services from Sudan; to export goods, technology, and services to Sudan; and to engage in transactions involving property in which the government of Sudan has an interest,” according to the State Department.

South Sudan’s Ministry of Petroleum and Mining tendered five cargoes of Dar Blend oil from Upper Nile in early July, for a total of 3.4m barrels. Sinopec subsidiary China International United Petroleum & Chemicals (Unipec) won four of the tenders: three 600,000-barrel cargoes for lifting from Port Sudan between 8 August and 24 August, and a 1m-barrel cargo for lifting on 27-28 August. The final, 600,000-barrel cargo was won by Geneva-based Vitol.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF)’s $3bn standby arrangement with the Egyptian government for the 2011-12 fiscal year will partly support a precarious budget loaded with the costs of the revolution against the regime of president Hosni Mubarak.

The European Union is seeking bids from consultants to provide services in the reform of Lesotho’s energy sector, improving its coordination function through restructuring of key entities and the regulatory framework. Bidders must be established in a member state of the EU or in an eligible country or territory. The contract will also support the Ministry of Energy and Meteorology (MEM) in the development and implementation of technical and financial planning instruments for increased access to sustainable energy in rural and in off-grid areas in addition to the existing on-grid extensions.

As South Sudan celebrates its birth and its neighbours issue statements of support, the Ilemi Triangle border dispute seems to have been forgotten. Nairobi and Khartoum have both eyed this notoriously volatile area’s oil prospects in recent decades, but Juba has yet to publically take a stance