Full report of Exxon’s US$7.3B audit not online – auditors reveal

Jun 09, 2024 News

Minister of Natural Resources, Vickram Bharrat with the audit team when the contract was awarded in May 2022.

Kaieteur News – Auditors that were integrally involved in the review of the US$7.3B expenses incurred by U.S. oil major, ExxonMobil, between the period 2018 and 2020 have denied that the full report prepared by the team has been published online.

VHE Consulting, a partnership between Ramdihal & Haynes Inc; Eclisar Financial; and Vitality Accounting & Consultancy Inc. was recruited by the government of Guyana back in May 2022 to conduct a cost recovery audit of the company. The local consortium was supported by International firm- Martindale Consultants.

Sources close to the process explained that approximately 40 pages of the audit report have not been included in the document that was made public by the government.

The source told Kaieteur News, “The audit team submitted a detailed report of approximately 170 pages, including a manager’s report to the Ministry.” The document available online however consists of 135 pages. See link attached for report: https://nre.gov.gy/2024/04/12/vhes-initial-audit-report-for-the-stabroek-block-cost-recovery-audit-2018-to-2020/

This newspaper previously reported that a number of major expenses were not captured in the second audit report. This glaring observation was made when comparing the document to the first audit report completed by British consultant, IHS Markit.

Contracts awarded for major expenses such as chemicals used in the operations; costs associated with the rental of supply vessels and drill rigs; subsea umbilical, risers and flowlines (SURF); helicopter charges; laboratory costs and waste treatment management among others have not been included in the report completed by the local consortium.

When questioned on this state of affairs, Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo who manages the petroleum sector told reporters that he did not check the document personally, but the full report should be online.

Jagdeo during his May 30, 2024 press conference explained, “I asked them to publish the audit report. It should be the audit report as received from the auditors, that’s the report so that would be the report they would publish, as received from the auditors. I have not checked it personally but I asked them to post it and they have posted it so that should be the report.”

Meanwhile, Minister of Natural Resources, Vickram Bharrat has been utterly silent on the subject. This newspaper reached out to Bharrat on May 30 to clarify whether the full report has been released to the public. The Minister responded saying “It’s online” but did not clarify whether it was the complete document.

This newspaper therefore asked the Minister again to say if the full report was published but did not receive a response. A reminder of the question was sent to Minister Bharrat again on June 2, at 11:17 am. Bharrat read the message an hour later but never responded. Subsequent calls to his mobile phone on Sunday were not answered.

The lack of information on the major contracts in the audit has raised concerns and questions regarding the government’s management of the petroleum industry, especially since Financial Analyst and Certified Accountant, Floyd Haynes previously told Kaieteur news that the team reviewed the numbers but was not allowed to reveal the information.

During an interview on Kaieteur Radio he explained, “I haven’t been told by my client to discuss this type of stuff so I want to respect the client. Once they ask me to speak on it, I’d be happy to provide (the information).” Haynes noted that, “We have detailed schedules of all of those things. What I can tell you is that those were some areas that we looked at keenly – drilling, mud, all those types (expenses), helicopters and we benchmarked them against industry standards.”

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