Gabon has taken the exceptional step of withdrawing the right of Addax Petroleum, a subsidiary of Sinopec, to exploit an oilfield in the country. Production at the southwestern Obangue oilfield, totaling 9,000 barrels per day (BPD), has been transferred since the end of last year from Addax to the new state-run Gabon Oil Co (GOC), set up in 2011. Officially, the Chinese firm is being sanctioned for failing to meet “contractual obligations”. Gabon’s complaints against Addax include “bad management”, “instances of corruption,” “shortfalls in the respect of the environment” and dodging taxes on oil exports. “After several months of fruitless negotiations, we decided definitively to withdraw the Obangue field from Addax Petroleum,” Oil Minister Etienne Ngoubou said. The incident is the first of its kind in Gabon and such measures against well-established firms such as Addax, which has operated in the central African country since 1996 and is the fourth oil producer there, are rare. Since it was bought by Sinopec in 2009, Addax has been exploiting five oil deposits on the basis of shared production with the Gabonese state, amounting to 23,000 BDP. The Sinopec subsidiary has responded by accusing Gabon of undue harassment and has taken the dispute to the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris. No date has been set for the ruling. Addax states that it wants to go on working in Gabon, which accounts for between 15% and 20% of its global production, although the Oil Minister has threatened to withdraw a second permit for the Tsiengui oilfield, also in the southwest, “if they don’t make any efforts” within 15 months, the South China Morning Post reports.