Albania ranks second in continental Europe in terms of onshore oil resources. The oil coming out of these wells is not of the best quality as of markets standards, as it is considered viscous and requires large amounts of diluent to make it more mobile and easier to extract from underground. However, its quality has not been a problem, as the Ballsh plant once and other refineries in the world manage to process it, and until today this business has resulted in great profits for its producers.
Contrary to this picture, the Albanian citizens, even though they have a large wealth of oil from their underground, pay the highest prices in the world to buy fuel. Today, all the oil produced in the country goes abroad, while the only refinery Albania had was degraded during a failed privatization and later sold for scrap on behalf of a bank.
The oil deposits in the Cakran-Mollaj, Gorisht-Kocul and Amonica wells could not be an exception to the Albanian context. But to explain more simply what happened, the story is like this:
A company related to Gazprom Neft (Russian) and NIS (Serbian), comes to Albania represented by an Austrian businessman with the firm Jurimex Kommerz Tranzit Ges.
The company applies to Albpetrol to take over the Cakran-Mollaj and Gorisht-Kocul oil wells. The request was made at the end of 2016 and in July 2017 Albpetrol sends a draft agreement to the Ministry of Infrastructure and Energy, which is accepted by the ministry and Albpetrol is authorized to negotiate the final contract and apply for a license at AKBN.
On September 9, Prime Minister Edi Rama hosts a meeting with former FBI agent Charles McGonigal, accompanied by Agron Neza. At the request of Agron Neza, McGonigal urges the Prime Minister to take care of the licenses granted in the field of oil extraction to Russian companies. Agron Neza and Dorian Ducka both had financial interests in the decision to grant these licenses – it is said in the documents of the FBI file.
The negotiations with Jurimex did not progress and in February 2018, Albpetrol opened a tender for the concession of oil wells in these same locations.
Out of 9 participating companies, the tender was won by the TransOil Group firm represented by Shefqet Dizdari as administrator and owner of 31.4% of the shares. Although being indebted to Albpetrol for the oil extracted from the Visoka field, the company TransOil Group wins the tender.
Shefqet Dizdari became a partner in February 2019 with Charles McGonigal, Agron Neza and Mark Thomas Rossini in the company ‘Lawoffice & Investigation’.
In this whole story, the only argument that Prime Minister Rama gave during his recent speech following the scandal was the fact that the well awarding procedure was finally done by a tender, but without giving an answer as to why, initially, a year before the final tender, Albpetrol had started negotiations without a tender with another company, and in the middle of the deal, the papers are torn up and a tender is opened? Who has prevailed here the principle of open competition or orders coming through closed doors?
Likewise, the Prime Minister did not explain why the tender was won by a company that was indebted to the state company Albpetrol for the provision of crude oil extracted from the Albanian underground, and instead of taking measures against it for the prejudice against public property, the opposite happens, 3 additional oil areas are given to this same company?
Why does the Prime Minister doesn’t explain that out of 9 companies that participated in the competition, the tender was won by the company in which persons A and B (in the FBI file), Agron Neza and Dorian Ducka had related interests?
In all this history, it does not really matter how the procedure was with an open or closed competition, as many properties are being given to foreigners today even without a formal competition. It is of little importance whether the law was respected or not, since the leader of the majority has the conditions and the votes to make the laws as he wants.
What matters here is who protects the interests of Albanians and their assets, the USA and the FBI or the officials who are voted for this task?
Today we are in the same situation as we were a decade ago: a country with abundant resources of oil but an importer of oil and at even more expensive prices than then. The state-owned oil production company Albpetrol, which has agreements for oil-bearing areas, results in financial losses, the accumulated losses reached 55 million euros at the end of 2021, while its financial reports are unreliable and the auditors of the financial statements express their opinion with Reserve.
Article by Ola Xame
