White Nile still faces Total war over Sudan oil rights

By STEPHEN FOLEY, The Independent

LONDON, Apr 25, 2005 — White Nile edges closer to tying up its controversial oil deal in newly-autonomus South Sudan. Phil Edmonds, the former England spin bowler-turned-serial chairman, and his partner Andrew Groves flew out to neighbouring Kenya on Saturday for talks with the nine-man ruling council of the South Sudanese government-in-waiting. The aim is to sign a detailed business plan by the end of tomorrow, but it remained unclear yesterday whether all nine could be pinned down in time.

adquarters of the oil group Total in the western Paris suburb of La Defense. (AFP) .

The detailed plan has been demanded by the Stock Exchange before it will allow White Nile shares to return from suspension. But the Stock Exchange is not the only adversary that Messrs Edmonds and Groves must overcome. Total, the French oil giant, continues to maintain its claim over the area that the South Sudanese are licensing to White Nile.

The peace deal that ended the civil war included the agreement to respect all previous oil deals, but a member of the new southern government, Costello Garang Ring, in London last week, was insistent that Total had blown its chance of hanging on to the exploration rights it first bought in the Eighties from the central government in Khartoum. John Garang, leader of the south, refused to meet French government officials at a development conference in Norway last week, he said.

However, Total ” and this is very curious ” says it is ‘continuing to develop a relationship with officials in the south of Sudan, continuing to talk to them and to explain our position’. A spokesman said meetings had been held in the past two weeks.

This is not a resolvable contractual dispute in the Western sense. It might be settled in a new north-south petroleum commission to be set up under the peace deal, but it is politics and money that will talk louder than any pieces of paper signed to date. White Nile finds a positive straw in the wind. There have been riots in Khartoum this month as the government- dominated students’ union protested against France’s support for a United Nations resolution demanding war crimes trials over atrocities in Darfur. Khartoum officials have condemned France, suggesting a cooling relationship with one of its old international allies, and weakening the diplomatic ties that might encourage Khartoum to fight for Total’s claims in the south.