There has been an alarming on the oil and gas industry worldwide. 

This reveals that the exploration and production of oil and gas resources onshore and offshore on the continental shelf directly encompass certain issues of ownership of the resources and control over activities to exploit these resources.

Therefore, even for the benefit and betterment of the Namibian people, there is a need for an effective legal and regulatory framework with crystal-clear and transparent legal, policy and fiscal terms. 

The main idea behind all these should be to facilitate the exploration and production operations in the host country to regulate the activities of the key stakeholders, such as licence holders, as well as the need to define in depth the administrative, economic and fiscal guidelines for future investment in the sector. 

Namibia is regarded as a frontier area, with a better comparative advantage, such as political stability and a rich endowment of natural resources. 

Geographically, Namibia will enjoy proximity to neighbouring Angola in terms of skill sharing and experience.

It is at the same time already a member of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and a major African oil and gas producer. 

In the south, it is bordered by South Africa, which has considerable offshore oil and gas production. 

However, our in-between or proximity among these countries should be leveraged well to compete on a fair ground – not for Namibia to be regarded as a sandwich to be crumbled due to imperfect competition practices in the region. 

The discovery of this nature is not peculiar, as countries in eastern Africa, such as Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda, have all recently discovered large oil and gas fields too. 

Despite all the successful advantages that cannot all be quantified in this analysis, there are certain grey areas that need to be considered. 

For example, whether the existing countries’ framework would be able to deal with conflicts over entitlement, ownership rights and control of oil and gas, catastrophic risks and environmental pollution, such as what happened in the Deepwater Horizon incident in the Gulf of Mexico. In this area, this already gives an alert for a sound environmental and strategic consideration by the government. 

Another is the offshore safety to avert an offshore disaster similar to the Piper Alpha, of which the environmental ministry is the guarantor in this arena. 

The problems with transboundary development, in this particular case, the agreement regarding the southern offshore boundary, remain sketchy, and may potentially contribute to uncertainty surrounding exploration activities in this area. 

Since more exploration activities are highly based in maritime boundary areas, it would be in the best interest of Namibia and its neighbour to address the possible existence of transboundary oil and gas resources. 

There is a need for a fair share and not a zero-sum game in terms of investors. 

Currently, the Namibian government holds only 5% on the Kudu Gas project, which is managed by Namcor. 

In order to Namibianise the oil and gas sector with power enshrined in the Mineral Act of 1990 and the Petroleum Act of 1991, there is still a need for a well-coordinated effort both from the Ministry of Mines, Energy and Industrialisation.