Access Bank saga: Seplat acquires assets of Cardinal Drilling Services
Sopuruchi Onwuka
Indigenous Energy firm, Seplat, has taken over four rigs operated by Cardinal Drilling Services and will continue to deploy the service tools in its operations in future.
The acquisition, according the company’s Managing Director, Mr Roger Brown, was part of the measures to address an embarrassing debt crisis that rocked the energy firm when local Access Bank Plc attempted seizure of its Ikoyi corporate office.
Roger Brown stated in the company’s interim report weekend that the acquisition was a difficult but practical measure to address the concerns over legal disputes impinging from its exposure to the liabilities of Cardinal Drilling Services.
The Oracle Today reports that Access Bank Plc had secured a court order to lock down the corporate office of Seplat Energy Plc over issues of debt related to a transaction with Cardinal Drilling Services, a contractor to Seplat.
In response, Seplat had declared that the issues of debt was vicarious on its business relationship with Cardinal Drilling Services and should not have been a direct responsibility or liability on the energy firm.
Roger Brown stated that Seplat entered a negotiated settlement with Access Bank to address “the risk of significant disruption to our operations and other opportunities from a long, drawn-out legal case.”
“We have therefore acquired the four Cardinal rigs and we are now focusing on fast tracking their deployment in future drilling campaigns,” he said without stating whether the company would float a unit to operate the rigs or leave it in the operations of Cardinal.
He stated that the deal on Cardinal related debt issues “completes the Board-mandated removal of Related Party Transactions,” maintaining the company’s earlier “position that legal action against the Company was wholly without merit.”
Mr Brown made it clear that Seplat’s engagement with Access bank on the debt issue was primarily to protect its businesses from the nuisance value of the case.
