Turkana Oil Deal to Be Kept Secret from Taxpayers – CS Munyes

Petroleum Secretary John Munyes has said that the Turkana oil deal that was signed between Kenya and Turkana oil exploration firms will be kept as a secret from the taxpayers.

The deal that is expected to raise a total of about 300 billion shillings from international financiers is an effort to improve and speed up the development of the South Lokichar oil basin.

Tullow Oil, Total, and Africa Oil are among the partners who signed the Head of Terms (HoT) agreement, as stated by Mr Munyes.

The agreement covers aspects such as the cost recovery, fiscal review and task incentives. However, the secretary declined to share the copies of these terms with the members of the media.

“You don’t have to worry about the details of HoT because it has taken good care of Kenyans’ interests,” Mr Munyes told the media.

“It took us 15 months of gruelling negotiations to come up with terms that are agreeable to all the parties.”

This declaration, however, defies the article in the constitution that states that the public has the right to access information held by the state.

Tullow’s executive vice-president, Mr Mark MacFarlane, opined that Hot is fantastic for Kenya and its joint partners and that it is indeed a milestone after a long period of negotiations in order to reach a final agreement that would favour all participating parties.

According to Mr Munyes, the deal is supposed to pave way for the Government to make arrangements for water delivery and agreement has to be made with the West Pokot County for this to be successful. Thus, water has to be supplied from Turkwel to Turkana to aid the oil project.

Officials of the oil majors said they agreed under the HoT that Amosin, Ngamia and Twiga will have a crude oil pipeline with a capacity to pump between 60,000 and 80,000 barrels per day (bpd) to a central processing facility and an export pipeline to Lamu. The infrastructure installed will also be designed to support future oil discoveries.

“I want to assure Kenyans that two years from now, a pipeline will be delivering at least 60,000 bpd of oil to Lamu for export, “said Mr Munyes.

The deal is seen as another step to development in the rift valley region as most people had deemed it unsuccessful and dormant.

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