ISLAMABAD:
While the country struggles to overcome the energy crisis, the provinces and the centre have entered into yet another tussle over the ownership of natural resources.
Future exploration activities in the country may be halted as the federal government has claimed 100% ownership rights on oil and gas resources – a move rejected by the provinces.
The tug-of-war between the provinces and Centre on different issues relating to the upstream industry – the exploration and development of oil and gas resources – has delayed the new petroleum policy, which has been pending for a few months.
Under the 18th Amendment, provinces have been given the right of 50% ownership of oil, gas and mineral resources.
Three wishes
In addition to the rights of 100% of resources, the provinces also want to regulate the oil and gas sector. However, the federal government claims that it has the legal right to regulate the upstream petroleum sector, itself.
The third issue is that provinces want the right to directly collect royalty, without the involvement of the federal government.
Sources told The Express Tribune that a high level meeting was held between representatives of the provinces and the Centre on Friday. However, both sides failed to reach a consensus over the issue. Upstream industry representatives also attended the meeting.
During the meeting, the provinces stuck to their demand of regulating the upstream industry and directly collecting royalty. However, the federal government was not ready to compromise, saying that it has the constitutional right to regulate the upstream industry, sources said.
Under the current mechanism, the federal government collects 12.5% royalty on crude oil and natural gas, and then, transfers it to the provinces after deducting 2% for administration charges.
The royalty does not become part of consolidated funds and net proceeds are transferred to provinces.
In 2010-11, Punjab received royalty of Rs1 billion on natural gas, Sindh received Rs26 billion, Balochistan received Rs4 billion and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa received Rs4 billion.
Regulating the upstream industry
According to a senior official, the ministry of petroleum and the Petroleum Exploration and Production Companies Association (Pepca) had sought legal opinion on the issue of regulating the upstream industry.
“The law division has supported the petroleum ministry’s point of view that the federal government can regulate the upstream industry after the 18th amendment,” he said, adding that Pepca had sought similar legal opinion.
The upstream industry also wants a one-window facility for regulations to resolve their issues after the implementation of the 18th amendment.
“After finalising the new Petroleum Policy, the Petroleum Concession Agreement (PCA) will be finalised to auction 22 blocks,” an official said. The maximum gas price for offshore wells will be $9 per mmbtu.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 4th, 2012.
COMMENTS (3)
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Pakistan is by law a federation, not unitary system. Federation is interaction point between provinces. Therefore, for last 6 decades, the policy of strong center has been failing miserably. The right of each province over their resources, land and policy making should be respected. 18th amendment should be respected in letter and spirits. Strong center is not working.Make provinces more strong and give them back their powers which center usurped for last 6 decades.
provinces stay always at logger-heads to one another, if they find the wholesome right on mineral resources the whole machinery will come to a dead end. as has been to Punjab's indusrty on account of gas-shedding from Baluchistan. There should be a handsome proportion of provinces in royalty, whereas the regulation and administration should be the responsibility of federation.
Provinces should have 100% control over natural and mineral resources and right to regulation as well. This would encourage constructive competition and may help to resolve energy crisis. Corrupt bureaucracy in the centre is responsible for all this energy crisis.