PetroChina Quits Bid for Shell’s OML 125 Block
By Fidelia Okwuonu with agency report, 02.26.2008
Few months after China National Offshore Oil Corporation Ltd (CNOOC Ltd) withdrew its bid for the Royal Dutch Shell OML 125, PetroChina, China's largest oil firm has also quit its bid for the same block.
Both companies were told that their bids, at around $300 million to $400 million, were too low for Shell's nearly 50 per cent stake in block OML 125, the Beijing-based source familiar with the matter said.
Although the source did not provide the production level of the block. "Both companies were told their bids were below other competitors," said the source.
The Lagos-based Centre of Petroleum Information, an industry information service, has reported that Shell owned 49.8 per cent and Italy's Eni group owned 50.2 per cent of OML 125, which produces about 24,000 barrels of oil per day. The source said Shell's sale of the block was part of the oil major's restructuring programme initiated last November, after its oil production facilities in the Niger Delta came under repeated militant attacks and lost significant production.
China's biggest investment in Nigeria, Africa's largest oil producer, is a $2.69 billion deal CNOOC Ltd entered into in 2006 for a stake in deepwater block OML 130, set to come on stream this year. PetroChina is working on four exploration blocks but only at study stages, the industry source said, without providing further details.
In an earlier report, Job titles and positions are being re-aligned with the rest of the Shell Group but they do not reflect a decrease in importance or accountabilities.
Basil Omiyi became full-time Country Chair of Shell Companies in Nigeria with effect from January 1, 2008, based in Abuja. The appointment of a fulltime Chairman for Shell Companies in Nigeria reflects the importance of Shell Nigeria to the Shell Group, and the growing importance of our interfaces with the executive, legislative and judicial arms of government.
Mr. Omiyi has had a long and distinguished career with Shell, heading up different areas of the business including External Affairs, Environment and Production, and we are pleased he will bring this wealth of experience to bear on our interfaces" he posited.Shell has till date kept mom on the said bid to sell its $900 million, about 49.8 percent of interests owned through subsidiary Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Co. Ltd.But reacting to the planned sale in a report Bloomberg media last year, Paolo Scaroni, Chief Executive of Apip, a unit of Eni SPA, holders of the remaining 50.2 percent, said the persisted Niger Delta crisis was not enough reason why oil majors should leave the country.
"The situation in Nigeria certainly isn't peaceful, but I don't think it is such as to push oil majors to leave," Scaroni had said in the wake of the reported plans by the royal Dutch company to sell off interest in the Nigerian oil blocks.
The two stakes, each of 49.8 percent - and owned through Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Co. Ltd. - are in deep water blocks OML-125 and OML-134, the latter formerly known as OPL-211. Agip, a unit of Eni, owns the remaining 50.2percent in each block. OML-125 produced 12,000 barrels a day of oil net to Eni in 2006. During 2006, Agip made a new discovery of both oil and gas in a well located in the block. OML-134 is still in exploration phase.
