Chad:Chevron and Petronas threatened with expulsion over tax arrears

摘要

A CRISIS IS brewing in Chad after the government threatened Chevron and Malaysia's Petronas with expulsion over alleged unpaid tax bills.The two foreign oil groups are part of the ExxonMobil-led consortium that pumps around 225,000 barrels a day of crude from several fields in the country's southern Doba basin.Oil is exported from the landlocked central African state through a 1,000 km pipeline across Cameroon to the Atlantic coast,in a project that was funded by the World Bank and other donors.Initially,it was hailed as a model for African development,with donors helping to draw billions of dollars in private-sector investment into one of the continent's poorest states.However,since first oil began to flow in 2003,relations between the government and its foreign backers have slowly turned sour.