The Brazilian 3rd Federal Court of Sergipe (north-east Brazil) blocked partly the Petrobras US$2.2bn sale of stakes in Brazil’s offshore pre-salt layer to Total and the ruling went in favour of members of the Oil Workers' Union of Alagoas and Sergipe (Brazil). The court agreed to their argument and ordered the Brazilian oil and gas regulator (National Agency of Petroleum, Natural Gas and Biofuels, ANP) to suspend the stake transfer.
The assets package deal which was signed between Total and Petrobras back in December 2016. It has been temporarily frozen in August 2017 by the Brazilian Federal Court of Sergipe in a response to the class action filed by the Oil Workers' Union of Alagoas and Sergipe. The union members lodged the file because they expected the state-run Petrobras to have gone in for a public tender to divest its stakes in the assets rather than moving ahead with a private negotiation with a foreign company. In the past, the Sergipe court froze a series of asset sales, divestments and partnerships undertaken by Petrobras to reduce debt and optimize capital spending.
The deal included the sale of Petrobras's stakes in oil fields (upstream) and thermal power stations to Total (downstream): a 22.5% share in the Iara concession (Santos basin), a 35% stake in the Lapa concession (Santos basin) and a 50% stake in the TermoBahia cogeneration plants. TermoBahia operates the Celso Furtado and Rômulo de Almeida thermal power stations, located both in Bahia.