THE Bermuda company involved in the Republic of Congo's scam to hide nearly half a billion dollars of oil revenues from creditors faces being closed down by the courts.

The Supreme Court has issued a winding-up petition with respect to Sphynx (Bermuda) Ltd. and the hearing will take place in the same court a week today.

A case in London's High Court exposed the company's role as one of a chain of companies controlled by Denis Gokana, president of the Republic of Congo's state oil company SNPC, which, according to the judgment of Mr. Justice Cooke, were used to hide oil assets from creditors.

Two local businessman, Trevor Williams and Arthur Jones, both of Consolidated Services Ltd., were hired to act as directors for the company from the time of its incorporation in February 2002 until they resigned in April 2005.

Both denied knowing anything about the $472 million in bogus oil trades that had passed through the company, nor did they even know the location of the company's bank account.

The week after this newspaper's story on the company's activities, Finance Minister Paula Cox and Registrar of Companies Stephen Lowe said they would be launching an inquiry into Sphynx and would take any necessary action.

Yesterday, a statement from Mr. Lowe read: "The winding-up petition with respect to the company has been issued by the Supreme Court and is scheduled for hearing on Friday, March 24, 2006 at 9.30 a.m., at which time the authorities will also be seeking the appointment of the Official Receiver to act as the provisional liquidator of the company."

Global Witness, the anti-corruption group, claimed in a recent report on the Republic of Congo, also known as Congo-Brazzaville, that its oil wealth "has for too long been managed for the private profit of the elite rather than for the benefit of its entire population".

Sphynx owner Denis Gokana is a special adviser to the Congo-Brazzaville President, Denis Sassou-Nguesso, as well as being the boss of the state oil company.

Despite the widespread revelation of spectacular corruption and waste in the oil-rich Central African country, the Republic of Congo was last week approved for international debt relief by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Little of the country's wealth in natural resources has trickled down to the people, 70 per cent of whom earn less than $2 a day.

Britain's newspaper revealed details last month how President Sassou-Nguesso and his free-spending entourage clocked up a hotel bill of nearly $300,000 in a week when they were in New York to attend a United Nations conference last year.

Staying at the plush Palace hotel, the president paid $8,500 a night for a three-storey suite with art deco furniture, a Jacuzzi bathtub and a 50-inch plasma television screen, the paper reported. His room service charges totalled $6,900.

The president's entourage of more than 50 people included his butler, his personal photographer and his wife's hairdresser. The group also occupied 25 rooms at the Crowne Plaza hotel, near the UN headquarters.

When it came to paying the bill, the president's staff astonished hotel receptionists by pulling out wads of $100 bills to pay more than $177,000 in cash.

Such examples of extravagance and the details of Congo-Brazzaville's attempts to skim from its oil revenues have left creditors bewildered at the decision to allow the country debt relief.

The World Bank and the IMF announced last week that the Republic of Congo qualifies for debt relief under the ten-year-old Heavily Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) initiative.

The institutions said the decision on debt relief, which covers some $2.9 billion of the central African country's $9.2 billion total of foreign debt, meant Congo-Brazzaville becomes the 29th country to reach the so-called decision point under the HIPC initiative.

However, the statement said the country must address "serious concerns" about governance and financial transparency in order to make the debt relief irrevocable at the so-called completion point ? which could be more than two years away.

In the meantime, the country will benefit from interim debt relief which frees it from debt servicing.

The lenders said the Republic of Congo has committed to bringing the internal controls and accounting system of the state oil company SNPC up to internationally recognised standards and preventing conflicts of interest in oil marketing, the lenders said.

This requires officials at SNPC to publicly declare and divest any interests in companies having a business relationship with SNPC, they said.

The government has also agreed to implement an anti-corruption plan, monitored by the IMF and the World Bank's International Development Association.

Earlier this month, World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz said there were concerns over the lack of transparency of Congo's oil sector, the standards of marketing procedures for its oil and how the oil profits ? about $2 billion a year ? were accounted for in the budget.