OPINION: Let us make our oil and gas industry totally Brunei oriented

I AM writing in response to a letter written by Pg Hj Abd Rahman Pg Hj Omar in the Opinion Page of Weekend Borneo Bulletin dated January 26, 2013 titled ‘How About Matching Up To Petronas’.

I would like to add more about Petronas which I hope our authority here can emulate. After oil was discovered offshore the State of Trengganu, Malaysia in 1974, the then Malaysian Prime Minister, Tun Abdul Razak Hussein formed Petronas. The purpose was to take part in the oil exploration.

During its incorporation it was headed by a young 28-year-old Prince from Kelantan, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah. Students from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) were groomed as future players in the Petroleum Industry. The best and brightest students were sent to Texas, America to study about Petroleum Technology. By early eighties, Malaysia had produced a few with doctorates in Petroleum.

At the early stage, Petronas did the oil exploration and production in joint venture with ESSO. A joint venture company was incorporated which was called ESSO Petronas Malaysia Incorporation (EPMI) and they did jointly oil production offshore Trengganu. By early eighties, under the then leadership of Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Petronas went international. By then they already had the expertise and experience to go it alone.

Presently Petronas is active in oil production in more than 20 countries – including in warzone South Sudan, Vietnam, Cambodia and few Arab countries to name a few. Few years back Petronas was also in a joint venture with Shell being awarded a concession by the new Iraqi Government to produce oil in one of the largest oil reserves in the world in Mosul, Iraq. And Brunei also gave Petronas 40-year rights to produce oil offshore Brunei namely in Block L and M beginning 2008.

In all places that Petronas has oil production activities, they employ only Malaysian staff.

For example, in South Sudan, they created a Malaysian village and were not in need of any foreign experts to assist them.

Petronas is already an international brand on par with ESSO, Shell, BP, TOTAL or any other international oil giants. They have even surpassed PERTAMINA of Indonesia although it was incorporated much earlier as to date PERTAMINA only operates in Indonesia.

Petronas also acts as a catalyst for business for Malaysians apart from providing employment.

Supply and services are done by fully Malaysian-owned companies. All the tanker ships that transport crude oil from Petronas-owned platforms to the refineries are also Malaysian-owned namely Malaysian International Shipping Corporation (MISC), Scomi Berhad, Halim Mazmin Berhad and Dayang Berhad, a Sarawak Company which employs mostly Malaysian crew.

There are now thousands of petrol stations under the brand name Petronas in Malaysia which is mostly Bumiputra owned.

The stations also act as a mini supermarket and international brand restaurants namely McDonald, Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) and Burger King.

Petronas brand petrol stations are also active in Thailand.

One of the biggest achievements of Petronas is also the creation of Petronas University in Perak, Malaysia whereby they teach and train young Malaysians about Petroleum Technology.

Now coming back to Brunei, we are left wondering when we can replace those foreign engineers with Bruneian engineers. When can Shell train enough Bruneian experts to take over from foreigners?

It is not enough sending Bruneian staff for attachment in foreign countries as it only helps them to earn more by getting more allowances but not learn more as basically they are doing the same as they did in Brunei.

Why not we ask Shell to sponsor and Brunei ask the Malaysian authority to allow Brunei students to study at Petronas University?

By doing so we will learn specifically about Petroleum Technology and hopefully we can produce many Bruneian engineers who are well versed in Petroleum Technology.

And we don’t really need to rely on those foreign engineers anymore.

In the same issue of Weekend Borneo Bulletin in Page 28 it was also reported that Shell and Ukraine inked a $10B shale gas deal.

Now since Shell has made some of their fortune in Brunei, why not we ask them to include us in this Ukraine deal, either in active participation or as shareholders?

Or better still, since we have given Petronas a 40-year rights to our oil reserve, why not Shell and Petronas include us in their joint venture to produce oil in Mosul, Iraq as a third partner?

Or better still from Petronas, how about including us in your activity in your new found oil reserves off Kota Kinabalu, Sabah?

I do hope that the Brunei Authority can look into this matter.

- Emzed, BSB

Dipetik dari - Borneo Bulletin