By Etim Etim
The brand new administrators of NNPCL appointed by President Bola Tinubu final week have been broadly welcomed by Nigeria’s oil trade chieftains and analysts for his or her cognate expertise and spectacular personal sector backgrounds. Nevertheless, they’re taking on an organization buffeted by continual political issues and unethical enterprise practices.
These administrators are from the opposite facet of the desk, as they’d been coping with NNPCL whereas they have been within the management of a number of the subsidiaries of the IOCs in Nigeria. The brand new board chairman, Ahmadu Musa Kida, rose within the trade to turn out to be Complete Nigeria’s Deputy Managing Director of Deep Water Providers in 2015.
Final yr, he turned an impartial non government director at Pan Ocean-Newcross Group. Bayo Ojulari, the brand new Group CEO, was till his appointment Govt Vice President and COO of Renaissance Africa Power Firm.
The Renaissance Group just lately led a consortium of indigenous power corporations within the landmark acquisition of your complete fairness holding within the Shell Nigeria value $2.4 billion. I wrote an article on this transaction in January titled “The exit of Shell”. Ojulari himself is a Shell veteran, simply as all different board members have labored at senior ranges at different IOCs.
They’re due to this fact properly knowledgeable concerning the deficiencies of NNPCL and are properly geared up technically to show it round into one other IOC, or a semblance of it. They will carry the very best practices within the IOCs to bear on NNPCL.
However they should overcome political interferences; opaque organisational tradition; continual trade issues and big corruption, amongst many different sometimes Nigerian challenges. Listed below are a number of of the issues they’ll face. Listed below are a number of of them:
The Upstream sectorOil theft is a serious drawback and the brand new board will face many obstacles because it tries to combat it. Each barrel of crude oil should find yourself in a single refinery someplace on the planet. The crude oil stolen from Nigeria just isn’t refined in Nigeria. The refineries that purchase them should know the place the crude got here from.
Subsequently, the syndicates stealing the Nigerian crude oil should be recognized throughout the Nigerian and international intelligence neighborhood. The brand new NNPCL Board members have labored with Shell (HQ in London), ExxonMobil (HQ in USA) and Complete (France). The house nation intelligence networks of those IOCs do know the way these thefts have been perpetuated through the years within the Niger Delta and the offshore oilfields.
Since these new Board members have labored on the highest degree within the Nigerian subsidiary of those IOCs, they’ll search assist from their HQs on methods to establish, title and disgrace the thieves thereby undermining their community. After all, the Board has to have the assist of the Presidency for this transfer.
Professionalise the exploration and manufacturing arm of NNPCL, known as NNPC E&P Restricted (NEPL), previously NPDC: For a very long time now, NEPL (previously NPDC) has been outsourcing the funding and improvement of its freely assigned oilfields to 3rd events, thus denying itself the alternatives to develop and retain company competencies and professionalism in-house.
NPDC (NEPL) was meant to be the Nationwide Oil Firm (NOC) of Nigeria, like Statoil of Norway (now known as Equinor); Petronas of Malaysia; Petrobras of Brazil; Pemex of Mexico and others of Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Oman, Brunei, and so on. It’s not late for the brand new Board to place NEPL to fund, develop and function their Nigerian oilfields competently as there are numerous Nigerians in-country and in Diaspora who might be introduced in to run the organisation effectively and professionally.
The brand new Board members have been on the management of efficiently operated IOC subsidiaries in Nigeria. Subsequently, they’ve the operational template they’ll deploy in NEPL. If Equinor of Norway can succeed, with many Nigerians working there, then NEPL can as properly.
Transparency of crude oil and pure fuel gross sales: The present opaqueness within the crude oil gross sales ought to be stopped. The opacity is at nearly each aspect of the enterprise. Even Finance Commissioners of the Niger Delta States don’t perceive how their states’ share of the 13 per cent derivation is calculated. They don’t even have the info on which the funds are calculated and paid. Subsequently, the brand new Board ought to be sure that the federation’s share of the income is accessible to the federating models with out them relying on the Freedom of Data request.
Merely meet the funding obligations NNPCL has with their JV operators: Nigeria (NNPCL) has been a laughingstock within the international Oil Business for not paying their 55 per cent to 60 per cent share for funding JV operations, but can be the primary to take their share of the JV manufacturing. The Board ought to merely do the fitting factor. Pay up NNPCL’s share of funds after which earn its share of the produced crude oil and fuel.To be continued tomorrow.Etim wrote from Uyo.
