KAMPALA
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- Oil firms tussle for Uganda oil fields
Uganda will review proposals for Heritage Oil’s assets and make a decision in two weeks, a senior official said, a move that seemed to contradict earlier statements supporting a bid by Italy’s Eni.
Some analysts say the government is still thrashing out internal disputes over whether to support Eni’s attempt to buy Heritage’s Ugandan assets or Tullow Oil’s pre-emptive right to acquire the blocks.
A senior government official, who attended talks between Tullow’s chief executive and President Yoweri Museveni late on Friday but was not authorised to speak to the media, said that the government had not made a “concrete decision” yet.
“The government will discuss all the proposals from all the companies in Uganda’s oil and gas sector and take two weeks to make a decision,” the official said on Saturday.
A government statement about the meeting said: “Museveni said government officials are due to meet to discuss the matter, and added that they would be choosing only capable and competent companies to participate in the oil and gas sector.”
Energy Minister Hillary Onek said on Thursday that Uganda would favour Eni’s bid to buy Heritage’s half-shares in Block 1 and Block 3A in the Albertine Graben region of western Uganda.
Kampala says it does not want a monopoly of its oil sector.
Tullow owns half of Block 1 and Block 3A and all of Block 2 and has started a process to sell the Heritage assets plus 50 percent of Block 2 to one or two partners.
The three blocks cover the Ugandan side of Lake Albert and contain recent discoveries that executives said could reach billions of barrels of oil.
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