AllAfrica.com Visit The Publisher's Site This Day (Lagos) June 12, 2003 Posted to the web June 12, 2003

Mike Oduniyi, With Agency Report Lagos

The Federal Government said yesterday it would relaunch negotiations with the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in a bid to get a higher oil production quota for Nigeria.

But OPEC. at an extra-ordinary meeting held in Qatar yesterday, decided to maintain its current production ceiling of 25.4 million barrels per day (bpd). This leaves Nigeria's production quota at 2.094 million bpd compared to her capacity of 2.6 million bpd.

The Director, Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), Mr. Macaulay Ofurhie said in an address delivered at a seminar on offshore oil and gas technology in Lagos, that the need to renew the bid for a higher OPEC quota was based on {he challenges posed by successes Nigeria had recorded in deep offshore exploration.

"As production commences from the deepwaters, Nigeria as a strong member of OPEC and the only one with large deepwater discoveries certainly will need to renegotiate her quota allocation level with OPEC," said Ofurhie, who was represented at the event by a-. Deputy Director in DPR, Mr. Kayode Oloketuyi. According to the DPR chief, the Federal Government needed to get an increased OPEC quota so as to continually convince the deepwater operators that "Nigeria is an investment friendly country and to guarantee sustainable development of the nation's deepwater assets."

Ofurhie said that the discovery of giant oil and gas fields in the Nigerian deepwaters and the unfolding potentials in its offshore basins are indications that with right planning and sustained growth, Nigeria will emerge as the main center of deepwater activities in the Gulf of Guinea, as Brazil currently is for the Gulf of Mexico.

Oil workers last weekend had expressed concern that oil companies under the present OPEC quota regime, will not be able to maximise output from these new fields, mostly located in the deep offshore, on which several billions of dollars have been invested. They also alerted the Government on the danger posed by the quota restriction to its revenue earning power.

Oil fields soon to go into production include Shell's Forcados Yokri and Bonga fields. Total's Amenam/Kpono field and ExxonMobil's Erha field.

Oloketuyi later told THISDAY on the sideline of the seminar that the Federal Government was approaching the demand for higher quota using political and technical means.

"We have submitted the technical details of what we have been doing in the deep offshore where we are. The political approach, which include demonstrating our economic needs as well as the need to sustain our democracy will be handled by government," he said.

The seminar was organised under framework of institutional co-operation programme between Nigerian government and its Norwegian counterpart.

According to Charge d'Affaires of the Norwegian Embassy in Nigeria. Kristin Teigland. the seminar aimed at sharing experiences enhance transfer of technology, assist in capacity and competence building.

Meanwhile, OPEC ministers ended a meeting in the Qatari capital of Doha yesterday, ieaving the group's production levels unchanged.

OPEC President Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah, said the 11-nation group would meet on July 31, this year to reassess the situation.

Al-Attiyah said that the July meeting would look at the impact of Iraq's return to the oil market and that OPEC would consider all options to maintain its interests.

Contrary to the widely held belief that the group would cut down on production to accommodate the entry of Iraqi oil into the market, OPEC's decision was said to be hinged on the fact that Iraq oil would not be reaching dhe market fast enough.

Analysts said prices had not retreated because Iraq has been slow to revive production, and political unrest in Venezuela and communal crises in Nigeria, had suppressed in the two influential OPEC member-nations.

Iraqi oil officials appointed by the US. occupation authority said on Monday that crude exports would not resume until month's end and that it would not reach pre-war levels until the middle of 2004.

Crude oil prices were at between $27 and $29 a barrel yesterday.

AllAfrica.com This Day (Lagos) INTERVIEW June 11, 2003 Posted to the web June 11, 2003

Recently Africans celebrated the African Day, marking the, 40th Anniversary of the African Union (formerly Organization of African Unity - OAU). T he Coordinator of the event in Nigeria, who is also the Dean of African Group in the country, Cote d'Ivoire Ambassador to Nigeria, Emile M'Lingui Keffa spoke to Kunle Aderinokun and Ify Isiekwenagbu in Abuja on the significance of the African Day, the challenges facing the Union, and the NEPAD Initiative amongst others. Excerpts:

What is the significance of the African Day?

This is the day that the Organisation of African Unity OAU was created about 40 years ago, that was May 25, 1963. About 30 African Heads of States at that time came together then to form the OAU. Since then, the organisation has been doing the task that was assigned to it until 2000 when again our Heads of State decided to move the OAU towards a more result oriented African Union (AU).

We, the African diplomatic corps in Nigeria decided that we should celebrate the anniversary of the beginning of the Union because we are Africans and because we are accredited in the most powerful African country and the country that has devoted its time, its money, its human resources for the unity and development of Africa and therefore we thought we should celebrate African Day. So I think this is a very important event for Africa as a whole and for

Nigeria, which has served as a leading country, that has considerably helped both the OAU and the young AU to achieve their set goals so far.

What informed changing the name to African Union?

Actually, I will go back in the history a little bit. Before some of our countries became independent in 1960, there was a debate in Africa and in the black world, that all Africans should get together and create one single country. That what was called Pan-Africanism and the people like Du Bois, Marcus Garvey, Kwame Nkruma, Nnamdi Azikiwe took part in that debate that all African countries should be united and they should create federation of African states.

Each state was to stay where it is and cooperate among one another. Then there were two groups; the group of Monrovia, and the Casablanca group. Casablan-ca said, everybody should become one nation at once, while the Brazzaville group preferred the option that, we move step by step. So when they created OAU in 1963, the decision was for us to integrate gradually, each nation should be sovereign, should manage its own affair but will have to cooperate among each other. And later on, we will see whether we should form a federation or not.

So OAU has worked within that decision, that is gradual cooperation among African countries. But now, our Heads of State feel we have to integrate faster, not gradually, we have to go faster. That is why they created a new body that will help us integrate faster, that is the African Union. The philosophy of African Union is more or less the same with OAU. Just that the mandate of African Union is to integrate African countries faster than the OAU has been able to do.

How?

For instance the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) is an important aspect to integration, because through NEPAD, our Heads of State will be meeting regularly to define their priorities and looking for a way of attaining the priorities. This is the way.

NEPAD is not going to make any miracle. It is the state members, it is the political will of different states. If Obasanjo wanted Nigeria to be working closely with other African countries and at the same time, and the other Heads of state say the same thing, then we will be going faster. If two or three countries wants to be faster and the other ones are not willing, then we will not go faster. It depends on all of us, including the people.

What is your opinion about NEPAD?

The NEPAD initiative is a very good one, because the reason why OAU was changed into AU was that the mandate of OAU was a kind of gradual approach to cooperation and integration that is, each country being sovereign.

The role of the OAU was gradually to bring the African country together, help them undertake their cooperation between them. But today, we realized that we are in a different world with globalization, etc, that our continent has to be stronger, they had to link together, they had to negotiate together to have a stronger negotiation power and this is why AU was created. But at the same time we also have to review the type of cooperation that we have with developed countries and NEPAD is that new approach to cooperation with international communities with the developed countries and I think the idea of NEPAD is very important, because today African countries are working together, far more than it was in the past.

The good thing about NEPAD is that, years back, we Africans sat here and waited until those countries, who have money decide to help us in the field that they find appropriate, but all that has changed now with NEPAD; which is a system whereby, we Africans ourselves are going to define the areas where we will like to be helped. And we will also be in the disposition to tell them how we'll like to be helped. And I think NEPAD as such is a very pertinent project.

What are the challenges facing the AU?

The challenges that the AU have ahead are numerous. These are great tasks that must be done faster. AU was created at a time when we are talking about globalization. So AU should try to bind African nations together and help them to put their strength together and work hard for the development of the continent, with a stronger negotiating power; economic and otherwise.

We have 53 countries and bringing them together is not an easy job and we are talking about 700 hundred million people speaking one thousand languages. Bringing all these countries together and harmonizing their interest is really a big challenge. The task is really a big one. To bring all these countries together, to harmonize their position, to make sure that everybody is willing to work together. This is a kind of challenge we are facing. Economically, we are the weakest, but we must bank on our strength as a strong populated continent.

What are the achievements of AU?

AU was created formally in July 2000. So up till now, the work of the secretariat has been to set up the organizational structure, so it is too early to talk of achievement because the organization has just been created three years and they are just trying to put in place the administrative structure and so on and creating institutions. However, the African Union is working through NEPAD to help our countries to achieve their development in a coordinated manner.

What's the role of AU in the war in Cote d'Ivoire and the current position there?

In Cote d'Ivoire thanks to the help of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and our international partners, the situation is progressively, gradually coming back to normal.

Practically for some time now, there has been no fighting. There was a ceasefire agreement which has been well respected, and people have started moving from one area to the other. And we have formed a government, which comprise the rebel and the regular government. The situation is getting better and we hope that it will normalize very soon.

Specifically, what role did AU play ?

The role of the AU is to try and liaise between the different factions. But there is a rule. When there is a conflict in a region, the priority is given to the regional organization. Here, in West Africa if there is any conflict the first organization that will be in the frontline will be ECOWAS. So continental organization will only help through regional bodies. AU has been doing a lot to solve the crisis. But AU has to go through a course and this is what they are doing.

Lets talk about the ECOWAS and the new ECOWAS passport that has just been introduced what's the motive behind it?

Well, as I have mentioned before the decision that was taken when OAU was created is to progressively come to the integration of African nations. But today we have realized that we are very, very far away from integration. And West Africa decided twenty five, thirty years ago that West Africans should try to integrate, before we can integrate the whole group of Africa, so the passport has been conceived as a way of making West African nations one nation that is, all of us should uniform passport like the European Union.

That is why West Africans are embracing ECOWAS passport, Nigeria decided two weeks ago that henceforth Nigerians should be holding the ECOWAS passport and this is actually the way to bring all different countries of West Africa to relate to each other as brothers and sisters from the same land.

The cooperation of West African countries is not only in the field of passport, we have a project whereby in one or two years, all the 15 countries of West Africa will have one currency. We have also projected in the field of transport, that is how to harmonize our policies in different fields, so that we don't waste our resources, such that we do not waste our efforts looking for buyers of our goods in far away places like Argentina, whereas he could sell same to a neighboring country in West Africa. We have to cooperate and to do that, we have to have good roads and so on.

What are the Major benefits of the ECOWAS passport?

Actually the benefit is that first you can move with this passport from one country in West Africa to another without any problem. And the ECOWAS passport will facilitate the transit through the borders and also, it will help those who travel out of Africa to be seen there as the people from the same land and I think this will consolidate solidarity and unity amongst our people.

How soon are we going to see the integration of the African nations in totality?

I think to integrate the whole of Africa you have to start region by region. Here in West Africa we have started. In Southern African have their own organization, so they are trying to integrate their economy and their population etc. The creation of Africa Union two years ago was decided because there is a need by the whole of Africa to integrate very fast. Like I said, the programme of NEPAD was conceived because Africans have to start to speak with the same voice. Africa has to learn to co-ordinate their effort to be stronger because we are in the period of globalization. If our countries go individually they will not be able to achieve anything. They will be weak, they will be divided and they will be manipulated. But they have to go together to be strong and this is what NEPAD and African Union is all about. And ECOWAS has shown the way, that it is the body within which West Africans can come together.

For instance in the gas project, since Nigeria produce gas than any other West African country the project has gone a long way in seeing how Nigeria can be the major gas supplier to the other West African countries that are in need of it. For instance, for Cote d'Ivoire to go and buy its gas or oil in Venezuela is nonsense when a brotherly country a few miles away is producing very good quality and quantity of the same product.

So this project, which for the time being includes Nigeria, Benin, Togo, and Ghana, was conceived originally for these countries, has actually been projected to normally cover all of West Africa and this is a step towards integration and an important one at that.

Is there any plans to integrate all the regions very soon and the target date?

Well you know our hope as a representative of the government. Our hope is that our countries integrate as fast as possible but things like this take time. You know when Europeans started in 1957, they started with a small group of countries that decided at that time to work together to cooperate in a specific sector.

As time went on, the number of countries increased and today we have the European Union with 15 members and they are going to be twenty-five very soon. They have started from 1957 to date. For we also, I think it might take us a little bit of time but I don't think we are going to wait for fifty years. We have to do it faster because Africa is a weak continent and therefore we have to put be together to be strong.

<a href=www.busrep.co.za>IOL Business report June 4, 2003 By Edward West

Cape Town - Exxoteq, the local subsidiary of international group Exxoteq Corporation, was planning to drill an oil well near Port Elizabeth in the second half of next year as new technology had made the exploitation of this country's oil reserves viable.

Exxoteq was also planning to list on the JSE Securities Exchange, possibly by August, according to Gerhard Brink, the managing director-elect of Exxoteq and previously a Soekor geologist.

It will be one of only two listed oil explorers on the JSE, the other being Energy Africa.

Brink, whose qualifications include 20 years as a petroleum geologist and seismic specialist as well as being a "proven oil finder" in Chile, Venezuela, New Zealand, Pakistan, Egypt and South Africa, said there was no oil-bearing rock in 99 percent of South Africa, but there was oil under the remaining 1 percent.

In 1967 Soekor drilled test well CO 167 north of Port Elizabeth, in the Algoa Basin. As with many onshore tests the results confirmed oil below the surface, but its economic viability could not be confirmed.

"Some of the wells Soekor sank showed oil traces. Soekor processed a test case gallon and it was good quality. Now we are taking the old data and blending it with new technology so we can accurately establish which of the wells hold economic promise," Brink said.

Frank Brown, a retired professor and consultant working with the University of Texas, had developed exploration models for potential oil deposits on the Texas and Gulf of Mexico coastlines. The areas are similar to the Algoa Basin.

On reanalysing the old data from Soekor, Brown wrote: "The information definitely indicates the prospective petroleum potential of the Algoa Basin, especially now that remarkable advances in sequence stratigraphy and petroleum systems have been made since wells were last drilled .

"Re-evaluations of mature and 'dry' basins in the US have had considerable success using newer concepts and technology." Brink said the Algoa Basin wells would probably all be marginal, including the one to which Exxoteq had the rights.

"Marginal means anything under 50 million barrels. That is the accepted minimum level that excites most major producers. Below it their heavy overhead costs make production unviable. Mid-size oil companies are exploiting fields with as little as 5 million to 7 million barrels. Even at this level they yields revenue in excess of $100 million," said Brink.

Brink said Exxoteq would also focus on exploration off the west Africa coast.

"Our international holding company, Exxoteq Corporation, uses what it calls a Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) system.

"It was developed to reduce costs on marginal fields. In simple terms it keeps the recovered oil in a storage facility close to the rig, separates out the water and other residues, then pumps it straight to awaiting tankers.

It was currently being used by PetroSA, "but we have the rights to use the system throughout sub-Saharan Africa".

"We are currently finalising discussions with a few west African governments to buy the rights to marginal oilfields, and the officials involved are aware that the FPSO system makes our bids viable," said Brink.

<a href=www.angola.org>Source: ANGOP Date: May 6, 2003

Houston, 05/06 - World Energetic Cities Partnership (WECP) Monday analyzed here Angola’s candidature to join the organization, alongside an Oil Technological Conference being held in Houston since Friday.

Luanda governor Simão Paulo had been invited to attend by Houston mayor Lee Brown, but ended up not traveling to the States.

However, the Consulate to Houston transmitted to the participants the interest of Luanda authorities to join WECP in the next months.

WECP is an association of 12 member cities from different regions, namely Aberdeen (Scotland), Baku (Azerbaijan), Daqing (China), Dongying (China), Halifax (Canada), Houston (US), Maracaibo(Venezuela), Perth (Australia), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), Stavanger (Noruega), Saint John(Canada) and Villahmosa (Mexico).

Among other objectives, the organization promotes exchanging of experience in various fields, the development of combined projects, sharing of information about planning, emergency, industrial diversity, international education, expectations and strategies from petroleum industries.

The Daily Times of Nigeria By Our Correspondent

THE Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Jackson Gaius Obaseki, and other directors, may be retired, any time from now in a move to restore sanity in the oil sector, the DAILY TIMES has learnt.

Gaius-Obaseki, who was one of the pioneer staff that joined the services of the corporation, then known as Nigerian National Oil Corporation (NNOC) in July 1972 was appointed GMD in June 1999 by President Olusegun Obasanjo.

Feelers from the Presidency indicated that President Olusegun Obasanjo may have finally succumbed to pressure from political associates, diplomats and a cross section of Nigerians to remove the GMD from office over his unseeming rigidity which has resulted in the nation losing millions of dollars.

The last straw, Presidency sources explained, was the recent fuel scarcity, which not only created unnecessary panic to government but also almost robbed President Oba-sanjo one of his major achie-vements in the last four years.

Coming close to the elec-tions, the said crisis caused many of President Obasanjo’s opponents to use it as plat-form to gather votes “which the President and his Vice did not find funny” he said.

It was gathered that the recent fuel scarcity, which still lingers in some states except Lagos could have been averted if he GMD had listened to advice of his lieutenants.

As the United States/Iraq war drew nearer and crisis in Venezuela persisted, he was said to have been advised to beef up petroleum importation even though the price was hovering between $26 and $28 per barrel, Gaius Obaseki was said to be adamant, insisting to make do with available products, considering the cost.

“The President in one of his routine discussions with the GMD even asked him what he was doing to ensure steady supply when war broke out in Iraq,” the source said.

Another offence, it was gathered was the haphazardly performances of the nation’s four refineries. Between 1999 to date, no government has ever committed funds to maintain the refineries as this present government.

“Yet, what we are seeing is refineries with installed capacity of 445,000 barrels per day processing less then 150,000 bpd (about 45 per cent capacity utilization)”

“With this, the huge expenditure on the refineries was wasted as the nation solely relied on importation which was viewed in government circle as a serious matter”.

The source said the Presidency was rattled four days ago over the importation of adulterated products when NNPC claimed that all the fuel importers met the international importation standard.

Although, the source said the Presidency appreciated the contributions of Gaius- Obaseki in repositioning oil and gas sector, government believes that the sector used further re-engineering.

Gaius-Obaseki who will clock 58 in November has two more years to officially retire from service.

Two of his colleagues who joined NNPC the same time in 1972: Andrew Uzoigwe, Group Executive Director, Exploration and Production and Alex Ogedengbe, Group Executive Director, Engi-neering and Technical services had retired.

It was not clear who is likely to succeed the GMD, but sources said one of his management team members: Group Executive Director, Refining and Petrochemical, Mansur Ahmed, the Managing Director of National Engineering and Technical Company (NETCO), Bunu Alibe, the Managing Director of Pipeline and Product, Marketing Company (PPNNC) and Dan Nzelu may be considered.