The Chad-backed meeting of Cameroon Oil Transportation Company (COTCO) in Paris in late May contravened regulations, according to a letter from Cameroon’s Société Nationale des Hydrocarbures (SNH).
In order to make it right, Chad must take a number of steps – including transferring equity in COTCO to Cameroon.
The SNH letter, signed by chairman Adolphe Moudiki, noted that it had not attended the meeting, nor had the Cameroonian company received a notice of the meeting.
Chad, last week, said the COTCO meeting had taken a number of steps changing the shareholder make up. In particular, it targeted an ExxonMobil unit, now owned by Savannah Energy. The meeting involved the dismissal of all directors nominated by Savannah Energy.
Moudiki’s letter said SNH had received copy of correspondence to Citibank Cameroun on shareholders in COTCO. The SNH official addressed his letter to Chad Minister of Petroleum and Energy Djerassem Le Bemadjiel.
Moudiki requested the minister provide the resolutions passed at the meeting.
Given SNH’s absence from the meeting, Moudiki said the “resulting resolutions would appear to be irregular, as they contravene COTCO’s statutory rules on the convening and holding of General Meetings”.
Meeting conditions
Moudiki noted that Chad’s acquisition, via Société des Hydrocarbures du Tchad (SHT), of Petronas’ stake in COTCO came with a number of conditions.
COTCO shareholders must continue to be represented on the board, Chad may only appoint four directors and SNH should receive an increased share in the pipeline.
Chad should transfer a 20% stake in COTCO to SNH, the chairman said. This would reduce Chad’s share from 53% to 33.77%, while Cameroon would have 35.17%. Cameroon President Paul Biya backed such a redistribution, he said.
Moudiki closed by asking the Chadian minister to ensure COTCO continued to operate efficiently. Chad should not allow the shareholder crisis to have an impact on the pipeline venture, Moudiki said.