The Government of Gabon has prolonged the deadline for the presentation of bid of the 11th Gabon Deep Water Licensing round, French seismic company CGG revealed.

The licencing round which was officially launched on October 27th 2015 was open for five months starting October 27, 2015, and the submission of bids were initially from February 15, 2016 and to end no later than March 31, 2016, Offshore Energy Today reports.

According to CGG, the extension was announced at the 6th African Petroleum Congress & Exhibition in Abuja a week ago. The bid is now expected to be submitted on April 29th, 2016, which to the company, gives interested firms an additional one month.

“The Oil Ministry has very high hopes for Gabon’s new 11th licensing round and are excited by the opportunities for the successful development of this highly prospective region. New deep-water exploration wells offshore Gabon, such as Shell’s recent Leopard discovery, indicate a significant pre-salt basin and the new 3D multi-client data acquired by CGG greatly upgrades the resolution of the pre-salt image, further enhancing the chances of exploration success,” Etienne Dieudonné NGOUBOU the Minister for Petroleum, had said during the launch.

Anita Fatunji