The Minister of Oil and Gas, Mohamed Aoun, stated that « What is happening in the oil sector today is the singling out of the Chairman of the Directors Board of the National Oil Corporation, in a flagrant, clear, frank and public violation, which transgresses and dares the prevailing laws and decisions in the oil sector, to the point that he is changing Presidency of companies. It is true that the Prime Minister supported him in some of these measures, but he takes many individual measures by bypassing the Board of Directors of the National Oil Corporation, unfortunately ».
He also said: « The position of the Directors Board of the Corporation has recently improved, as they responded to him and issued a written memorandum requiring their disapproval of the recent changes regarding the boards of directors of oil companies. The worst transgression is that he retained more than ten billion six hundred million Libyan dinars, or about three billion nine hundred Seventy-nine US dollars in foreign companies from October 2021. These amounts belong to the sums and sovereign resources of the Libyan state, which he should not have exceeded, and unfortunately he is still acting as if this is his own property ».
He continued saying: « For me, since I have assumed my duties, there was no personal dispute between me and Sanallah, and also, I did not know him basically. He worked in Ras Lanuf complex, then moved to the Benghazi asphalt factory, and then he was appointed as a member at the company’s board. After he was appointed as the head of the Company by the undersecretary of the ministry. All of these are flagrant legal violations and should not pass under any circumstances. No one is supposed to accept them ».
He concluded by saying: « Sanalla feels stronger by the aid of the foreigners and does not deny this. He stated several times through the company’s page that he is dealing with the US Department of Energy. We asked him for an official memorandum containing information in particular and he did not provide it, as he claims to be supported by Foreign countries such as America and Britain, but we are in a country where our parents and grandparents lived and we will live a decent life in it. We don’t want to be controlled by any alien, no matter what ».