Amabhungane Petrosa's Deal With Russia Implodes

It was Cabinet not PetroSA which announced, in December 2023, that Russia's Gazprombank had been selected to restart Mossel Bay's gas-to-liquids refinery.

The choice of a sanctioned Russian bank was seen as risky by some and suicidal by others, but with Cabinet's seal of approval, the R3.7-billion deal had the political cover it needed to go ahead.

Now, a year later, Gazprombank appears to have reneged on the deal, leaving PetroSA scrambling to find a new partner for the mothballed refinery, which is costing PetroSA upwards of R500 million a year to maintain.

The details of how the Russian deal soured are set out in two draft internal audit reports and letters exchanged between PetroSA and Gazprombank, obtained by amaBhungane from a number of sources.

The documents suggest that Gazprombank's bid should have scored just 40 points out of 100 not 80 which would have put its bid in distant third place.