Thursday, November 5 2009

Opposition Senator Wade Mark on Tuesday warned of legislation in the United States which could make public, financial information on the deals between foreign energy companies and the Government of TT.

Mark said the Government has been using “confidentiality” as the reason for not disclosing the details of contracts with foreign companies, including the price of natural gas and tax revenue collected.

He said the Government could find itself in an embarrassing position.

Speaking in the Senate Mark said there were two pieces of legislation proposed in the US Congress related to transparency of energy companies, “The Energy Security Through Transparency Act” and “Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative Disclosure Act”.

Mark said, “Both are on track in different houses and they are trying to get the US President to approve this legislation.” The Energy Security Through Transparency Act which was introduced in September is calling for the US to be a candidate for the Energy Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI).

He said the Act proposed requires that no later than 270 days of enactment, the Securities and Exchange Commission will issue rules which will require companies listed on the US stock exchange to detail payments to foreign governments “for the purpose of the commercial development of oil, natural gas or minerals”.

Mark made these comments while winding up the motion he brought which calls for the Government to take steps to effect proposals of the EITI through “appropriate legislation and administrative action in respect of statistical reporting of oil, gas, and mining revenue payments made to the Government of TT by the various companies involved in the exploitation” of TT’s natural resources. The motion was brought on June 23.

He said the Government was accountable to citizens for the benefits being derived from exploitation of the country’s resources. “Why is it Mr President, the Government afraid to tell this country on a disaggregate basis how much income or revenues they are getting from oil and gas from each of these giant multinational companies?”.

Mark criticised the lack of transparency and accountability in agreements involving State companies.

He said if there was EITI situations could be prevented such as the project at Petrotrin which started at $2 billion and increased to $9 billion. Responding to Mark, Minister of Trade and Industry Mariano Browne said disclosure on contracts was available through the Public Accounts Committee and projects of State companies were included in the Public Sector Investment Programme documents.

Independent Senator Gail Merhair outlined her reasons for not supporting Mark’s motion among them was that many countries including China, US and Canada were not part of the EITI.

In addition, she disagreed that TT’s “domestic strategy and competitive advantage” should be publicised internationally.