Hemla Africa Holding AS, a wholly owned indirect subsidiary of Oslo-listed PetroNor, and two of its board members, Norwegian nationals Gerhard Ludvigsen and Knut Søvold, have been indicted in Norway for gross corruption and gross accounting violations in relation to oil licenses in Central Africa.
Norway’s anti-corruption authority, Økokrim, alleges that they bribed a company owned by the Congolese president’s family to facilitate permit rights to a major oil site in the Central African nation. The oil fields involved are majority-owned and operated by the privately held Franco-British group Perenco, with PetroNor E&P participating alongside it as a joint-venture partner in several large oil and gas projects in the Republic of the Congo.
These developments closely track earlier reporting by Investigate Europe as part of the larger cross-border Perenco Files investigation. The journalists detailed how Hemla and its board members awarded equity stakes in a group of oil fields to members of the presidential family, including the president’s daughter, through arrangements that were not publicly disclosed at the time.
In 2016, Perenco and Hemla secured 40 per cent and 20 per cent stakes respectively in the offshore PNGF Sud oil bloc, one of the country’s most promising licences, after which Hemla discreetly transferred a quarter of its own holding to a Congolese entity effectively controlled by the Sassou-Nguesso family.
Read more on Investigate Europe.
