Rubis Kenya CEO Deported Over Economic Sabotage

The government of Kenya on Wednesday canceled the work permit of Rubis Energy CEO Jean Christian Bergeron and ordered the immediate deportation of the CEO for hoarding and exporting fuel despite shortages in the local markets.

Rubis management led by the legal team began negotiations with the government officials from the Ministry of Energy, Mining, and petroleum in a bid to stop his deportation.

The move by the government follows the revelation by the Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (Epra) that leading Oil Marketing Companies are exporting fuel to the neighboring countries causing shortages in the country.

On Monday EPRA had warned that Oil Marketing Companies that will be caught hoarding fuel would face revocation of their licenses and import allocations among other sanctions.

Epra Director-General Daniel Kiptoo, in a letter to Petroleum Principal Secretary Andrew Kamau, said the regulator had identified firms that had chosen to export fuel at the expense of local consumers.

“Epra has analyzed the daily petroleum loadings over the past four weeks and noted that a number of oil marketing companies have in the period under review given priority to export loadings, while the local market was left to suffer intermittent supply,” Mr. Kiptoo said in a letter dated April 12.

“Epra hereby recommends that in the allocation of capacity for the next three import cycles, a key consideration should be given to the reduction of capacity share for all OMCs who increased their transit volumes over and above their normal quota during the supply crisis period.”

The dealers increased the stock exported to the neighboring countries to over 60 percent, against the traditional shares of 40 percent, to earn more.

The dealers have been accusing the government to have not paid them subsidies for the last four months, worth 32 billion shillings, a figure that the Ministry of Petroleum and Mining disputes, saying the outstanding amount is 13 billion shillings, after releasing 8.2 billion shillings to the dealers on April 4.

Rubis Energy Kenya is owned by Rubis Energy, a subsidiary of the Rubis Group which is listed on the Paris Stock Exchange following the full acquisition of both KenolKobil and Gulf Energy Holdings in November 2019. The acquisition meant that Rubis became a formidable competitor in the gas business in the region.

Rubis is a major player in the fuel distribution business in Kenya. The independent French operator controls 8.6 percent of the local market, making it the third biggest marketer after Total Energies and Vivo Energies. The sister company to Rubis, Gulf Energy controls 2.7 percent of the market.