R.E Court ruling 26th December26 Dec 2020 13:21
There appears to be a lot of crossed wires regarding todays expected news from the court.
The main misconception is that the JR has been denied, sorry but that is not true.
Only 2 parts of the application have been denied, there are others outstanding.
The 2 parts that have been denied pertain only to the application concerning the February and April approvals.
Parts outstanding (which will not be heard today but we may get news of how the judge intends to proceed)
The applicants seek to challenge and have quashed Ferreira’s decision to grant environmental approvals in February.
Approved changes to the project and a new environmental impact assessment (EIA) in November.
Newbold’s alleged approval of Bahamas Petroleum Company’s (BPC) EIA in February.
Approval of the amendment and resubmitted EIA in November.
The decision to approve changes to the project without an amended EIA and EMP.
The applicants also seek to challenge and have quashed the government’s decision in April to renew the validity of BPC’s licenses to December.
The decision in August to renew those licenses to April 2021.
And the decision in November to renew or re-extend the validity of the company’s licenses to June 2021.
If any of those parts have fallen within the time allowed then the law does not allow the judge to deny them without a hearing, even if they are "water tight". So although they may be denied they have to be heard.
BPC are set to be heard by the judge on January 6th
Now that's the legal bit out of the way, I do not believe the drill will be stopped, but none of the above points can be dismissed regarding the application for a JR. I remember posting a quote from an RNS which to my mind left open a reasonable challenge. Hopefully it has all been buttoned down, in any event most of the challenges above are in regard to decisions made by the BG and not BPC, but of course they would have an impact on BPC.
I suspect because of the time sensitivity of the application and any effect it may have, the application will be heard 1st week of January. If for any reason a JR was granted, which would allow for an injunction to be applied for, I do not believe an injunction would be granted since BPC were never named as respondents and are carrying out their obligations under the licences issued way back in February (not withstanding allowances made due to covid) And if it were to be granted the judge would expect a large sum of money put up.
So although most of those challenges will almost certainly be denied you can not rule out all of them. And I think that is backed up by BPCs request to be heard Jan 6th.
Please remember I am no damper, just being realistic. The drill goes on and we look forward to the coming weeks and hopefully hit loads of good oil.
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