Foreign firms involved in Venezuelan oil ventures have threatened to challenge state-run PDVSA’s award of drilling contracts worth $3.2billion, a news report said, citing several unidentified sources.
They sources accused PDVSA of rushing the tendering process for the Orinoco Belt project and said the firm did not provide bidders with enough detail about the contracts, Reuters reported.
PDVSA declined to comment.
Foreign oil companies have already intervened in the tendering process for Orinoco, forcing the cancellation of a deal for Trenaco on the grounds that the Colombian trucking firm was not equipped to do the job.
This time, contracts have been dished out to Schlumbereger, Oklahoma-based Horizontal Well Drillers and Venezuelan business Y&V, the report said.