KOTA KINABALU: A Sabah Barisan Nasional component party wants the state government to insist that Petronas abandon a planned 480km pipeline to channel gas from Kimanis to Bintulu in Sarawak.
United Pasok Momogun Kadazan Murut Organisation (Upko) also wants an increase in oil royalty for Sabah and suggests that a five-percentage point hike was “doable”.
Upko president Tan Sri Bernard Dompok said the pipeline project should be stopped to encourage the downstream processing of gas pumped from offshore fields on Sabah’s west coast.
“We realise that the gas pumped from Sabah may be too little to develop a liquefied natural gas sector but there are other alternative industries such as urea and plastic manufacturing,” he told reporters after a seminar on the oil and gas industry organised by Upko Youth here yesterday.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi had reportedly told Sabah Barisan component party leaders at a meeting on May 31 that the Petronas gas pipeline from Kimanis near here to Bintulu would be stopped.
On June 11, however, Petronas vice-president of gas business Wan Zulkiflee Wan Ariffin was quoted as saying that the RM390mil pipeline project would proceed and due for completion by March 2011.
Dompok, who is a Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, noted that Petronas appeared to be defying the Prime Minister.
He said unlike other states with oil and gas reserves, namely Sarawak and Terengganu, which had related industries, there was none in Sabah.
“The only thing Sabah has is the gas pipeline ending at Gayang in Tuaran and that too is for an independent power producer. It is understandable for Sabah to feel left out in this regard,” Dompok said.
On the petroleum royalty increase, he said his party was not objecting to the 20% requested by the Sabah Progressive Party but felt that a five-percentage point increase was more practical for now.
He said the increase was achievable if the Federal Government was willing to forgo its share of the royalty as stipulated in the petroleum sharing agreement.
Source : The Star
