“Kenya to wait longer for the oil trillions”

 Kenyans may never know details of how trillions of crude oil revenue would be shared between the government and foreign producers, amid soaring opacity over every aspect of production so far. This is despite a vow by President Uhuru Kenyatta to promote transparency at an international forum three years ago, and passage of a law enabling public access to information….

 Tullow Oil, the British exploration firm which claims to have spent nearly Sh200 billion recoverable from proceeds of oil sales, says it has no problem publishing its production sharing contracts. The government, however, insists on maintaining secrecy, and has made no effort yet to audit the reported expenses incurred by Tullow.  Petroleum PS Andrew Kamau said confidentiality about the contracts will be upheld because the country does not have a uniform agreement for the various exploration companies. “If we do that right now when we are just starting, other companies will want to be given the same agreement as Tullow,” said Mr Kamau. But Martin Mbogo, Tullow’s country manager, contradicted Kamau's position, saying his firm had published similar contracts elsewhere. “We have encouraged the government that we take no exception in disclosing those contracts,” he said, citing that Tullow’s contracts in Ghana are public.