NOC: Selling oil alone can lead to corruption in Libya

The Chairman of the Libyan National Oil Corporation (NOC), Farhat Bengdara has said that the NOC’s operations are not void of political and social pressures, and the latter are represented in the threats of Libyans to close oil fields if their relatives aren’t hired to work as oil sector employees.

In a press statement, Bengdara said the selling of only oil production encourages consumption and corruption, stressing that “if everyone does not feel that he is benefiting from oil revenues, he will go to close the fields, as happened previously.”

He highlighted that the NOC’s management had been seeking to maintain the current level of production (1.2 million barrels per day) and increase it to 2 million over a period ranging from three to five years, yet he voiced fears about the lack of the insufficiency of the budget of the NOC, and thus the lack of fuel and the interruption of electricity.

Bengdara pointed out that the annual budget for purchasing diesel and gasoline amounts to 36 million dinars, adding that Libya does not deal with the method of “exchanging oil for the supply of fuel, but with selling oil and part of the revenue is paid to suppliers for gasoline and diesel.”