BOLIVIA: GOVERNMENT SAYS NATIONALIZATION OF NATURAL-GAS RESOURCES COMPLETE.
Bolivian President Evo Morales celebrated the signing of new contracts with foreign companies that extract natural gas from his country at the end of October, boasting that his government had completed the "nationalization" of its hydrocarbons resources. Negotiations with Brazil's state-owned petroleum company formed the largest challenge to the nationalization project, but the two sides appeared to have come to an agreement by Nov. 1, the end of the six-month deadline Morales set for the natural-gas nationalization to be completed.
Morales: We will continue recovering natural resources
Morales announced the nationalization of Bolivia's ample natural-gas resources on May 1 of this year, sending troops to occupy gas fields owned by foreign petroleum companies (see NotiSur, 2006-05-12). The move strained Bolivia-Brazil relations since Brazil's state-owned oil company Petroleo Brasileiro S.A. (Petrobras) stood to lose huge assets, and negotiations between Bolivia's government and Petrobras remained unfinished until the last minute.
In August and September, Morales shuffled the top officials in charge of Bolivian hydrocarbons as the administration pushed to complete its vision of nationalization (see NotiSur, 2006-09-29).
Morales trumpeted the completion of his ambitious natural-gas and oil-nationalization plan on Oct. 29, though key issues remained to be addressed with Petrobras, Bolivia's largest investor. Petrobras was one of seven foreign companies that signed new deals, just after a midnight deadline that night, allowing them to continue operating under the control of the Bolivian government.
When Morales, Bolivia's first indigenous president, announced on May 1 that he would nationalize the country's hydrocarbon reserves, he gave the companies six months to cede majority control of their operations or leave.
When the process ended just after the deadline to wrap up the nationalization talks, Morales joined representatives of eight companies for the signing ceremony in the capital of La Paz, achieving one of his nine-month-old government's central goals.
Among the companies were two affiliates of Petrobras, Spanish-Argentine company Repsol YPF, and Repsol's Bolivian subsidiary, Andina. The French company Total SA and the US-based Vintage Petroleum signed nationalization deals Oct. 27.
At the ceremony, Morales said the petroleum nationalization would be only the first step in his campaign to recover control of Bolivia's natural resources...
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