EDITORIAL: Give Kenyans access to oil profit sharing details

Even as Kenyans continue to revel over the prospects of joining the oil producing nations club, there is still a lot of work to do ahead.

For example, the government must come out clean on the details of the profit sharing contract for the Turkana oil.

We say this because secrecy is always a recipe for future conflict.

The earlier the Turkana County residents and Kenyans in general know what the contract entails the better as it would stem any rumour mongering.

Kenya must strive to avoid the natural resource curse that has befallen other oil producing states in Africa.

A good example is Nigeria which has been burdened by conflict in the oil rich Niger Delta region.

Kenyans and the local community in the oil producing zone must know what is in store for them.

The country’s recoverable oil reserves are estimated at 750 million barrels of crude oil and are considered commercially viable.

The early oil export scheme was rolled out last week following months of wrangling over the resource allocation share between the national government, county government and the exploration firms.

Even as the country tests the global market’s response to its product by shipping out early stocks in the export scheme to gauge the price point and understand the logistics, there is need to ensure that all the concerns raised by the local community are thrashed out properly.

We must avoid a situation where negative currents continue to fester long after we have started exporting the black gold.

This also calls on the government to glean lessons from what has transpired in Nigeria or Angola so as to come up with a fool proof mechanism that will see the local community and country as a whole benefit from the oil proceeds.