NOC chief Mustafa Sanalla’s regular complaints of being underfunded have finally paid off. On 5 October Libya’s Tripoli-based government ordered the central bank to hand LD1.5bn ($1.06bn) to National Oil Corporation (NOC) to sustain and increase oil and gas output.
Just last week NOC warned that a failure by Tripoli to increase NOC’s budget could cause oil output to “fall precipitously over the next nine months” (MEES, 4 October). NOC had received operational and capital budgets 39% and 40% respectively lower than requested this year – and even these sums have been paid months late. (CONTINUED - 631 WORDS)
