Pilatus battles Pilatus over permit

摘要

► Highly coveted but still unexplored, a basin in Congo has become a battleground between two companies of the same name. Advised by Congolese lawyer Tsaty Boungou, the Swiss firm Pilatus Energy AG owned by United Arab Emirates businessman Abbas Youcef recently filed suit in Brazzaville for "counterfeiting" against a company using pretty well the same name, Pilatus Group.The latter is run by Loik Le Floch Prigent, former chief of the defunct French oil company Elf. Youcef, who once employed Le Floch as a consultant, fears he could use the similarity of the companies'names to illicitly gain ownership of the Ngoki license, which Pilatus Energy operates in the Congo river basin.