The Sudanese government Tuesday came to an agreement with an international watchdog over discrepancy in oil productivity figures.
A statement from the Sudanese embassy in Nairobi said Global Witness acknowledged that confusion over the actual figures was caused by the use aggregate figures without taking into account the export-oriented net figures.
"Global Witness is now satisfied with the accuracy of figures cited by the government, while the oil ministry confirmed the absence of any fraud in the figures for oil production," said the statement.
The agreement was arrived at during a seminar on transparency in oil production held in Khartoum.
Oil Minister Lual Deng stressed the significance of transparency and its continuity in the coming period. "Without it we cannot live in satisfaction. Transparency is needed so that oil doesn't become a curse," he said. Mr Derek Plumbly, chairman of Assessment and Evaluation Commission which took part in the seminar described it as a positive move in the path to correct the information.
He called for capacity enhancement of the staff at Ministry of Energy and Mining of Southern Sudan, and involvement in the all the stages of oil industry.
"There is need to show more transparency and clarity, and attributed the confusion that happened recently to the absence of actual figures," he said.
Sudan's current crude production is around 450,000-470,000 barrels per day.
South Sudan received $2.9b in oil revenues in 2008 and $6b since the signing of the peace agreement. According to the CPA, oil revenues from wells in Southern Sudan should be shared equally. Much of Sudan's estimated six billion barrels of oil are in the landlocked south, but most of the refineries and the port are in the north.
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Despite the recent statement made by the Sudanese embassy in Nairobi, Global Witness has at no point expressed satisfaction with the accuracy of oil production figures published by the Sudanese government.
We were pleased last week to finally hear the governments perspective for the production figure discrepancies first highlighted by Global Witness in our September 2009 report, Fuelling Mistrust. However, the data to support the governments explanation has not yet been made available to us or indeed to the ordinary citizens of Sudan; though we welcome the promise of the Minister of Petroleum, Lual Deng, to do this. Full clarification of these discrepancies is critical given the role of the oil wealth-sharing agreement in promoting peace between the north and south both now and after the referendum.
We look forward to receiving this documentation from the Ministry of Petroleum and to the quick completion of an independent audit of the oil sector as promised by the government. Until these things are done and a verifiable transparency mechanism is built into the oil sector, unanswered questions and significant gaps in information will remain, and ordinary citizens will continue to be unable to trust that Sudans oil revenues are being shared fairly.
Dr. Rosie Sharpe, Campaigner for Global Witness, London
Despite the recent statement made by the Sudanese embassy in Nairobi, Global Witness has at no point expressed satisfaction with the accuracy of oil production figures published by the Sudanese government.
We were pleased last week to finally hear the governments perspective on the production figure discrepancies first highlighted by Global Witness in our September 2009 report, Fuelling Mistrust. However, the data to support the governments explanation has not yet been made available to us or indeed to the ordinary citizens of Sudan; though we welcome the promise of the Minister of Petroleum, Lual Deng, to do this. Full clarification of these discrepancies is critical given the role of the oil wealth-sharing agreement in promoting peace between the north and south both now and after the referendum.
We look forward to receiving this documentation from the Ministry of Petroleum and to the quick completion of an independent audit of the oil sector as promised by the government. Until these things are done and a verifiable transparency mechanism is built into the oil sector, unanswered questions and significant gaps in information will remain, and ordinary citizens will continue to be unable to trust that Sudans oil revenues are being shared fairly.
Dr. Rosie Sharpe, Campaigner for Global Witness, London