Energy, oil and minerals
Soma Oil & Gas: the British-founded oil explorer in Somalia
Soma Oil & Gas was set up in London in 2013 and in August 2013 became one of the first foreign firms to sign an exploration deal with Somalia's new federal government. It paid for a large offshore seismic survey. Payments it made to Somali officials under a 'capacity building' deal led the UK Serious Fraud Office to open an investigation in July 2015, which it closed in December 2016 for lack of evidence. A successor company registered in the British Virgin Islands now holds three offshore blocks.
The 2013 deal
Soma Oil & Gas was incorporated in April 2013, a month before the London conference on Somalia of May 2013. In August 2013 it signed a deal with Somalia's federal government to explore for oil offshore (Bloomberg, in World Oil, 10 August 2015).
The company was chaired by Michael Howard, a former leader of the UK Conservative Party, and funded by the Russian businessman Alexander Djaparidze. His firm Winter Sky owned 30 percent and provided $50 million for a seismic survey (same source). Soma said it had spent $40 million on surveys of 60,000 square kilometres off the coast (same source). The Wikipedia article on the company describes a 20,552 km 2D seismic survey in 2014 that showed deep-water potential (Wikipedia, Soma Oil & Gas).
The payments and the investigation
About eight months after the oil deal, Soma made payments to Somali government officials under a capacity-building agreement. A report by UN investigators said these could be a conflict of interest (World Oil, 2015). The UN Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea was reported to have said that at least $580,000 paid from June 2014 might have been corrupt payments, which Soma denied (Global Witness).
Soma said the UN had "fundamentally misunderstood" the agreement, that the government had asked for it, and that the money covered costs such as the legal fees of a Canadian lawyer advising the government (World Oil, 2015).
| Date | Step | Source |
|---|---|---|
| July 2015 | The UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) opens a criminal investigation and searches Soma's London office on 31 July | World Oil, 2015 |
| Late 2015 | A Somali government inquiry finds no evidence of a "quid pro quo" deal with Soma | The EastAfrican |
| 2016 | The UK High Court refuses Soma's request to stop the investigation | DAC Beachcroft |
| 14 Dec 2016 | The SFO closes the case: "insufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction" | SFO |
The SFO said it had never suspected Michael Howard personally (World Oil, 2015). No charges were brought.
The company today
In 2020 the business moved to Soma Oil & Gas Ltd (BVI), registered in the British Virgin Islands and owned through a holding structure by Basil M. Shiblaq. In 2023 it took over production sharing agreements 129 and 130 (Mid Somalia High basin) and 192 (Mogadishu Deep basin), and in 2024 the federal government recognised it as sole operator (Wikipedia, Soma Oil & Gas). A 2015 study by RPS Energy, presented by Soma, estimated 21 billion barrels of oil in place across its blocks, before risk (same source).
For the wider story of oil in Somalia, the 2020 Petroleum Law and the first offshore well drilled by Turkey in 2026, see Oil and gas in Somalia.
Sources
- Bloomberg, in World Oil, 10 August 2015 · worldoil.com
- Wikipedia, Soma Oil & Gas · en.wikipedia.org
- Global Witness · globalwitness.org
- The EastAfrican · theeastafrican.co.ke
- DAC Beachcroft · dacbeachcroft.com
- SFO · sfo.gov.uk
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Where this matters
Same era
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