Stop political harassment of EO Group -AFAG

THE Alliance For Accountable Government (AFAG) has called on the government to stop what they described as the political harassment of the EO Group.
It noted that the 25 charges said to have been preferred against the EO Group were politically motivated and calculated to dent the image of Mr George Owusu and Dr Bawuah Edusei in the corporate world and devalue Kosmos’s shares.
"The raiding of the office and residence of George Owusu by the police; the intimidation by the Attorney General to Kosmos USA to terminate the appointment of George Owusu and the freezing of his bank accounts and assets since November 2009 are ominous signs," a leading member of AFAG, Mr Anthony Karbo, said at a press conference in Accra on Tuesday.
He said but for the perseverance of the EO Group, after being rejected by 12 oil companies in the US, Ghana would not have found the Jubilee Oilfield, adding that the alliance had established that as of 2002, all major oil companies regarded oil exploration in Ghana as high-risk and a graveyard.
Mr Karbo said that led to the departure of companies such as Hunt Oil in 1999, Fusion Oil and Gas from Australia in 1999, Sate Fe in 2000, Nuevo in 2002 and Dana in 2005, and explained that "all the wells drilled by these companies yielded no viable commercial discoveries".
He said with the help of Greater Houston Partnership, a major business group in Houston, Texas dedicated to the promotion of business between Houston, Texas companies and the rest of the world, the EO Group organised a conference in Houston to enable Ghana's energy experts from the Ghana National Petroleum Company (GNPC) and the Energy Ministry address the conference participants on the offshore hydrocarbon potentials in the country.
The EO Group, he said, then facilitated a visit to Ghana by Vanco Energy which resulted in Vanco taking an oil exploration block in the country.
"The EO Group, without making any success with Vanco, solicited interest from other companies, including Texaco, Oxy, Shell, the Chinese oil company but they were all reluctant to come to Ghana due to the risk (it costs $1 million a day to drill an oil well. It can cost up to $80 million to drill one oil well)," it said.
Mr Karbo said it was ironical that the China oil company which refused an offer by the EO Group to explore oil in Ghana in 2003 was now in a position to buy the $4 billion shares of Kosmos.
In December 2003, he said, the EO Group came into contact with the technical personnel of Kosmos Energy whose primary focus was to explore high-risk petroleum prospects in Africa, and that "the EO Group and Kosmos on the sidelines entered into private negotiations in which EO was given 3.5 per cent working interest".
"Furthermore, the EO share of 3.5 per cent is not deductible from the government of Ghana's shares but from Kosmos," he emphasised, and stated that "this cannot be said to causing financial loss to the state".
Mr Karbo said the deal of 90 per cent to the exploring private firm and 10 per cent to the state was introduced by Mr Tsatsu Tsikata, then GNPC Boss as an enticement sufficient enough to bring foreign experts to explore at their own cost.
"Such is the case of the agreement between Ghana (10 per cent) and Dana (90 per cent), Ghana (10 per cent) and Hunt Oil (90 per cent) and also that of Ghana (10 per cent) and Nuevo (90 per cent), all signed by Mr Tsatsu Tsikata in 1998, 1997 and 1999 respectively.”
In any case, he said, it was documented that most oil companies prior to their exploration made a deal of 10 per cent of net returns to Ghana and 90 per cent to the firm, and that that provision had been there before the EO Group joined in the search and it was in accordance with the Ghana Petroleum Law, approved by the GNPC Board, the Ministry of Energy and Cabinet, and unanimously ratified by Parliament in July 2004.
Mr Karbo said Dr Paa Kwesi Nduom was then Energy Minister, and he signed the agreement prior to the required paperwork, and questioned the silence of Haruna Iddrisu, Alhaji Amadu Sorogho, Moses Asaga and Dr Kwame Ampofo, who were part of the Parliamentary Select Committee that worked on the agreement.
"If the AG's outfit has any questions arising out of a deal that has been ratified by Parliament, the most appropriate forum to seek redress is the Supreme Court," he said, adding "we are also aware that Anadarko Petroleum's (the main oil rig operator in the Jubilee Oilfield) preliminary investigations in accordance with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) for any possible fraudulent dealings had the EO Group exonerated.