African Petroleum seeks arbitration over offshore blocks termination in Gambia

African Petroleum Corporation Limited has announced that its wholly owned subsidiary African Petroleum Gambia Limited has lodged Requests for Arbitration with the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes.

The request is in relation to The Republic of The Gambia’s notification of the purported termination of AP Gambia’s exploration licences over Blocks A1 and A4 (as previously announced by the Company on 8 January 2014).

The Gambia in January terminated the blocks claiming that African Petroleum violated the country’s petroleum law.

“These Licences have been terminated with immediate effect. The Gambia government will not allow any institution to acquire licences only to keep them for speculation. In our bid to harness our natural resources for the benefit of Gambians, we are not going to deal with speculators,” the presidency said in a press release, as quoted by Reuters.

African Petroleum Corporation Limited is a West African focused oil exploration company, operating ten exploration permits in five countries (Côte d’Ivoire, The Gambia Liberia, Senegal and Sierra Leone).  APCL is currently listed on the National Stock Exchange of Australia.