Kuwait oil row as minister tries to shuffle top execs – Al-Omair says believes oil prices have bottomed out
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KUWAIT CITY, Nov 4, (AFP): The chief of state-owned Kuwait Petroleum Corp has refused to carry out the oil minister’s decision to swap the CEOs of two subsidiaries, risking a row in the sector, a newspaper reported Wednesday. Nizar al-Adasani, chief executive officer of KPC, the Gulf state’s energy holding, said in a letter that the minister has no powers to make the decision.
On Tuesday, Oil Minister Ali Al-Omair issued a decision swapping the posts of Hashem Hashem, CEO of Kuwait Oil Co, and Sheikh Nawaf Saud Al-Sabah, CEO of Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Co.
“The decision is beyond the scope of your authority,” Adasani told the minister in the letter, posted by Al-Rai newspaper on its website. Such issues must be decided by the Supreme Petroleum Council and the KPC board of directors.
“As a result, your decision can not be implemented,” Adasani said. There was no immediate reaction from the minister, who is abroad. Kuwait is pumping around 2.8 million barrels per day and sits on around 7.0 percent of world reserves, according to latest data. The sector generates more than 90 percent of public revenues.
Kuwait’s oil minister said on Wednesday he believed oil prices had bottomed out. Asked whether he agreed with recent remarks by Qatar’s energy minister that oil prices had bottomed, Ali Al-Omair told reporters on the sidelines of a carbon conference in Riyadh:
“Yes I agree with him, because now for two to three months, the prices don’t go down. So maybe yes, they are at the bottom.” As he spoke, Brent oil was trading around $50.70 per barrel. Omair also said: “Now we can see that several rig rates have declined as a number and the high-cost production started to withdraw from the market. For about six months we can see a decline in the rig rates. Of course this would help the prices.
“But the other point which would help the prices is economic growth, so we have to wait and see how the economic growth in south Asia, in Europe, in America proceeds. If this is going to increase, as economic growth, this would improve the prices.”
Asked whether OPEC should stick at its meeting in December to its current oil market strategy of not reducing production, Omair replied:
“OPEC should not cut production alone, yes … I think OPEC should stick to its unity. OPEC now has been targeted by the non-OPEC countries … but if there is any cost or cutting in production, this should not be only for OPEC countries, we have to share together the cost of reduction.”
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