Houthi terrorism against the oil sector, from stopping exports to impeding production
English - Wednesday 08 February 2023 الساعة 04:36 pm
Aden, NewsYemen, exclusive:
For the third month in a row, the oil export process is still suspended due to the attacks launched by the terrorist Houthi militia on the export ports in the liberated governorates, with a presidential confirmation that the matter can continue for months to come.
The head of the Presidential Leadership Council said, in a televised interview at the end of last December, that the recent attack by the Houthi militia on the Al-Dabbah oil port in Hadramout caused the halt in oil exports due to the dumping of the pump, and indicated that repairing it would take about 6 months and would cost the state more than $50 million.
The cessation of oil exports as a result of the Houthi militia attacks constituted a painful blow to the oil sector in Yemen, which is still trying to recover from the previous blow it received with the outbreak of war in 2015 by the terrorist Houthi militia, which led to the cessation of oil production and export and the departure of oil companies from the country.
A cessation lasted for about 3 years, despite the fact that the oil production fields in Hadramout, Shabwa, and Marib remained outside the circle of raging battles, and the legitimate government controlled them and the two export ports (Al-Dhaba in Hadramout and Al-Nashima in Shabwa), in exchange for the Houthi militia’s control of the export port in Ras Issa in Al-Hodeidah Governorate.
The legitimate government succeeded in resuming oil production by the end of 2018, with small quantities of about 16,000 barrels per day, compared to 142,000 barrels before the outbreak of the war in 2015, while the peak of oil production in Yemen was in 2001, which reached about 438,000 barrels per day.
The resumption of oil production and export by the Yemeni government came after handing over a number of oil sectors that foreign operating companies left because of the war, to affiliated national companies (Safer, PetroMasila), while some foreign companies returned to resume their work, such as Calvally and OMV.
During the past four years, the legitimate government did not disclose the real figure for the volume of oil production and export, but previous statements by the Prime Minister indicated that it ranged between 60-70 thousand barrels per day. Weeks before the Houthi attacks, the Minister of Oil had indicated that production would soon be restored in Sector 5 in Shabwa Governorate, which was received by PetroMasila, which means adding about 20,000 barrels per day to daily production.
All figures indicate that oil production is still below the production ceiling it was in before the outbreak of the war, despite the return of most of the production sector to work, and national companies are handing over the tasks of operating the largest of these sectors, which indicates the existence of aspects of imbalances and shortcomings in the oil sector.
This imbalance and shortcoming was revealed in a report prepared by a parliamentary committee formed recently to investigate the facts regarding what was raised about the sale of some oil sectors. However, the report included an important testimony of the head of the Oil Exploration and Production Authority, Eng. Khaled Bahmeish, who is legally responsible for supervising companies operating in the field of oil exploration and production.
In his response to the Parliamentary Committee, the head of the Oil Exploration and Production Authority lists a long list of clarifications that reinforce his judgment on the incompetence and ability of the national companies that received the oil sectors from foreign companies, stressing that they did not even succeed in maintaining the production ceiling from the oil fields during the era of foreign companies.
Bahmish says that the national companies limited their work to production from ready-made production sectors for the purpose of oil production, and depleted the oil reserves discovered from these sectors without implementing development programs to maintain production, while many wells were closed due to the financial inability to maintain them.
The Chairman of the Commission draws attention to the fact that the basic principles applied in the oil industry require very high financial capabilities and modern techniques and technology, which national companies do not possess and the effects of this appeared - as he says - in its inability to maintain the level of production in the wells previously dug by foreign companies, and in its complete inability to complete the development of the remaining areas of the sectors' fields.
Stressing that these capabilities and technologies, in addition to the large capital, are capabilities that only major oil companies possess with experiences in the oil field, stressing the need to work to encourage foreign companies to return to resume their work in the oil sectors in Yemen.
What the head of the Oil Exploration and Production Authority is asking for, it seems that its implementation by the government has become difficult in light of the repeated threats directed by the Houthi terrorist group against oil production companies in Yemen in conjunction with its attacks on export ports, which makes oil investment offers in Yemen a great risk in the eyes of foreign companies, thus becoming a new blow by the terrorist group against the oil sector after its success in completely paralyzing it three months ago
