THE company headed by would-be oil and gas tycoon Malcolm Bendall and his senior geologist have been named in the worldwide data leaks known as the Panama Papers.

The revelations, although not proof of any wrongdoing, could open old wounds for what is estimated to be dozens of Tasmanian investors who lost hundreds of thousands of dollars after Mr Bendall’s search for oil and gas in the Central Highlands – which he says was prompted by a vision from God – failed.

And they come as the State Government is just weeks from deciding whether to give Mr Bendall a gas and oil exploration licence for Tasmania’s Central Highlands – a region he once told Tasmanian investors had enough oil to rival a “rich Arab state.”

Clive Francis Burrett, who was chief geologist and director of Great South Land Minerals, is one of several Tasmanians named in the Panama Papers and Offshore Leaks Investigation.

These include several current and former residents of the state – some in prominent positions.

In May, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, more than 370 reporters in nearly 80 countries, published a searchable database called the Panama Papers that it said “strips away the secrecy of nearly 214,000 offshore entities created in 21 jurisdictions, from Nevada to Hong Kong and the British Virgin Islands”.

A similar investigation, from 2013, called the Offshore Leaks, was based on a cache of 2.5 million secret records about the offshore assets of people from 170 countries and territories.

There is no suggestion those named in the investigations had acted improperly.

Mr Burrett is named in the documents as a director of the Cyber Finance Group, a shareholder of Empire Energy.

Mr Bendall heads Empire Energy that announced in January it was “part of an international consortium, formed to explore for oil, gas and helium in the Tasmania Basin in Australia”.

media_camera The Panama Papers, containing documents of Mossack Fonseca, unveiled more than 200,000 entities using offshore accounts. Picture: The Asahi Shimbun/Getty Images

Tasmanian Greens senator Peter Whish-Wilson said that as part of a long-running Senate Inquiry established by Christine Milne, he had “heard time and time again that people often set up businesses in places like the British Virgin Islands to avoid the basic public scrutiny that companies face in Australia”.

“Panama, the British Virgin Islands and the Cayman Islands all refuse to share tax and company information with the rest of the world earning them the status of ‘secrecy jurisdictions’,” he said.

In January, prominent church leader Lucas Jacometti, the founder and pastor of the C3 church in Hobart and a man with links to Mr Bendall and Empire Energy, had been lobbying state and federal MPs, government departments and Tasmania’s Co-ordinator-General John Perry to get oil exploration back on the state’s agenda.

A week later, in a statement mysteriously delivered to the Sunday Tasmanian offices, Mr Bendall confirmed his interest in a new oil and gas exploration licence that was up for grabs through government agency Mineral Resources Tasmania. At the time, the revelations opened old wounds from former investors including a then 99-year-old former sailor Don Garnham who told the Sunday Tasmanian he had invested about $280,000 in Empire Energy but had had trouble getting answers about his investment.

Mr Garnham has since died and his estate is discussing legal avenues to recoup his investments.

An Empire Energy spokesman in Hobart refused to answer questions from the Sunday Tasmanian.

A man previously identifying himself as a representative of Mr Bendall has not returned the Mercury’s emails and Mr Burrett has not been able to be contacted.

The Sunday Tasmanian visited a Kingston home listed in the Panama Papers as Mr Burrett’s address. Mr Burrett no longer owns the home.

The owner said he thought Mr Burrett was living somewhere in Asia.

When asked about the status of Mr Bendall’s oil and gas exploration licence bid, a State Growth spokesman said “the process is currently ongoing and we expect it to be finalised in the coming weeks”.

Senator Whish-Wilson said he met representatives from Mr Bendall’s companies when he was a stockbroker in New York.

“But I thought that what they were trying to sell me was far too high a risk for any of my clients,” he said.

“High-risk mining exploration is not for the faint-hearted and can often lead to heartache for mum and dad investors.

“Governments around the world need to take strong unilateral action to tackle the use of ‘secrecy jurisdictions’ by penalising the companies who use them through higher withholding taxes and by stopping them from getting access to government contracts or exploration licences.”