"CSOs call for end of secrecy in oil deals in a petition to parliament"

A group of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) working in the areas of Oil Governance and Transparency have implored government to end to secrecy in the oil sub sector. In a joint petition to the Parliamentary Committee on Commission Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises (COSASE)...the CSOs argue that the increased secrecy in the petroleum sub-sector is likely to trigger an ‘oil curse’.

The 6 page petition...is signed by 15 CSOs under their umbrella body – Oil Governance and Transparency Alliance (OGOTA). The CSOs are;  Action Aid Uganda (AAU), Federation of Uganda Women Lawyers (FIDA), Global Rights Alert (GRA), Great Lakes Institute for Strategic Studies (GLISS), Transparency International Uganda (TIU), Anti Corruption Coalition Uganda (ACCU), Oxfam International Uganda and Uganda National NGO Forum among others.

“We [CSOs] believe that in spite of the continuous assurances by government of Uganda officials that oil will not become a curse, the level of secrecy with which government is transacting businesses with regard to oil and gas resources is the very definition of an oil curse,” the petition reads in parts.