Zanzibar is expected to soon pass a law that will allow the country to begin negotiations with investors in the oil and gas sector.

According to Island’s President, Ali Mohammed Shein (photo), the Bill will be passed into law at the next meeting of the House of Representatives. He noted that once the House completes works on the Bill, it will be sent to him and he will sign it into law.

“This law will allow us to directly negotiate with investors in the area of oil and gas and I’m sure that this will enable our government to get a lot of money,” Shein revealed during the tour of Tanzanian President, John Magufuli, Sweetcrudes reports.

Magufuli urged Zanzibaris government to speed up the passing of the law in order for the country to start benefit from its resources. “I will be happy when I see oil being extracted in Zanzibar,” he said, adding that what Tanzanians want was to benefit from the natural resources.

Oil and gas has been an antagonistic issue for Zanzibaris including members of the Zanzibar House of Representatives as they have been demanding that oil and gas issues be separated from Union matters. Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Lands, Settlement, Water and Energy, Ali Khalil Mirza, has said that as Zanzibaris anticipates official sovereignty on natural resources, the government is strengthening the oil and gas sector through capacity building.

The move, he said, includes training and performing structural reform in the Energy and Mineral Department. The new arrangement would include an Oil and Gas Division that will be transformed into an oil and gas agency later.

The government is concentrating on training future oil and gas experts. The objective is to have an operational oil and gas division at department level by next calendar year and a fully operational agency by 2020,” Mirza said.
 
Anita Fatunji