It has been a difficult and often embarrassing few weeks for Venezuela's state-owned energy producer PDVSA, which is still battling to convince its clients that it has finally overcome the operational difficulties caused by the recent and disastrous general strike.
PDVSA officials say the company is producing just over 3m barrels per day -its pre-strike capacity- despite the absence of the 18,000 former employees dismissed for supporting the strike. PDVSA normally provides 40% of government revenue and 80% of export income, and so its self-proclaimed return to normality is a source of great pride, and enormous relief, to President Hugo Chávez 's government.
But an accident in mid-July suggested there may be some substance to the allegations of shoddy safety standards aired by former managers, while a bomb attack on company headquarters and PDVSA's failure to present its 2002 accounts were also far from reassuring signs.
A black day. PDVSA's disastrous 16 July began when a bomb went off outside its headquarters in the Caracas district of Chuao in the early hours of the morning, luckily without claiming any victims. Worse news was to follow though. Later that same day, two employees were killed and two injured when a valve ruptured releasing toxic gas while they were carrying out maintenance work at the El Palito refinery.
El Palito, which is run by President Chávez 's cousin, Asdrúbal, has been plagued by a series of technical hitches since it restarted operations in early January. The ageing 130,000-barrel/day refinery is a complex operation and was severely affected by the general strike, which was observed by the vast majority of its staff.
Although company officials urged opponents of the Chávez government not to make political capital out of the accident, representatives of the dissident oil workers' association, Gente de Petróleo, and the Confederation of Venezuelan Workers, CTV, were quick to criticise the new-look PDVSA's safety record.
'Incidents such as this prove what we've been saying,' CTV executive secretary Alfredo Ramos said. 'The oil industry is being run by inexperienced people.'
Sabotage. Gente de Petróleo has repeatedly alleged that PDVSA bosses have frequently sacrificed safety in their race to restart the industry, and has blamed them for oil spills in Lake Maracaibo and warned that the company risks destroying major deposits by not following proper procedures.
PDVSA's president, the former Opec secretary-general Alí Rodríguez, and his board have consistently denied the allegations and can point to the safety certificates they have received from international insurers who have carried out a number of inspections at PDVSA's installations and crude terminals over the last few months.
Rodríguez also notes that the pre-strike PDVSA was itself no stranger to pipeline leaks, oil spills and accidents. (Indeed, the first foreign partner companies to undertake joint ventures with PDVSA were often left open-mouthed at the company's cavalier attitude to the environment.) With dozens of kilometres of elderly pipelines running under Lake Maracaibo, minor spills have always been a fact of life, PDVSA argues, and are no reflection on the streamlined company's safety procedures.
PDVSA also has a 'Get Out of Jail' card marked 'sabotage'. Any spillage, breakdown or accident can safely be laid at the door of sacked oil workers spoiling for revenge. Even the investigations into the deaths of the El Palito workers will look at possible sabotage, officials warned. Rodríguez has been quick to point the finger, accusing sacked workers in the east of loosening valves that control gas supplies and trying to undermine the company's electrical system. 'A more open and more violent campaign of sabotage is beginning,' he recently warned.
Squabbles. Former PDVSA workers deny they would ever damage their beloved installations, but they have certainly not been above slashing a few tyres and breaking a few windows in the past. The Cold War between the company's present and past employees is set to heat up further over the next few months as PDVSA steps up its attempts to evict former employees still living in company accommodation.
This policy has already led to a number of showdowns between police and former workers, but Rodríguez, a one-time leftist guerrilla who is no stranger to conflict, has made it clear former strikers can expect no concessions.
But few former employees are prepared to hand back their houses peacefully while their pensions remain frozen and their pre-strike salaries unpaid. Although the company has not said so openly, the cash-strapped company clearly considers making payments to the strikers to be one of its lowest priorities.
Rodríguez said in mid-July that the company would observe whatever package the Venezuelan courts decide, although he added the rider, 'and who will pay for the millions of dollars that these people cost this country?'
2002 accounts. PDVSA's battle with its former employees, and the recent accidents and bomb attack, are hardly encouraging signs. But what has really raised eyebrows internationally is the company's failure so far to deliver its year-end report for 2002 to the US Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC).
PDVSA has released some unaudited financial statements, but no definitive version was forthcoming as of late July, and the SEC has been pushing hard for the figures because PDVSA has issued bonds in the US. Although Rodríguez is confident the company will be able to deliver the figures before the final deadline of late September, there are serious concerns that in the meantime PDVSA will be unable to access the finance it desperately needs to maintain its current production level.
'Pretending nothing is happening is bad for the country since this generates a lack of confidence in the international markets,' Gente de Petróleo leader Juan Fernández noted. 'If you don't present your accounts, how can you create the confidence that's necessary when you ask for credit?'
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