The Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum
Corporation, NNPC Dr. Ibe Kachikwu has indicated that the country may well
be on the verge of a significant oil find in the lake Chad area in North
East Nigeria based on analysis of recent seismic 3D data generated from
the Chad Basin.
In a presentation to the Petroleum Club, Lagos, over the weekend, titled:
Ongoing Reforms in the Oil Industry: Impact of NNPC Reforms on the
Nigerian Economy, Dr. Kachikwu stated that the Corporation is injecting a
lot of energy into the effort to ensure success in this regard.
“There are signs from the latest 3D seismic studies that oil may well be
very close to being found now in Lake Chad after very many years of
trials. I think that this is very key. It is key both for the
geographical balancing of oil production and it is also very key for the
purpose of Refinery placement in the North in terms of access to crude. I
am optimistic that by the end of the year we should be able to announce
something major on this, ’’ the GMD said.
Dr. Kachikwu noted that in driving and developing Nigeria’s oil and gas
sector, certain key areas of urgent intervention have been identified
thus : running production acreages with transparent and profitable
partnerships to bridge capacity and funding gaps; encourage investment
inflow into to Nigeria’s oil and gas industry; engagement with local
communities and driving regulation to develop the sector income- via
encouragement of the fast track PIB to clarify direction and encourage
long-term investment in the industry.
Providing specifics on the intervention targets, Dr. Kachikwu stated that
the NNPC is projecting the inflow of USD 20 billion in 2016 to enable the
Corporation fund major projects and improve its bottom line going forward.
He described 2016 as a crucial year for the NNPC as it is expected to
transit from historic loss environment to profit making domain.
In the area of engagement with host communities, Kachikwu stated that the
years ahead NNPC as the senior partner in the various Joint Venture
arrangements must take leadership in fostering a healthy and symbiotic
host community engagement outlook which must focus in what he termed
“What the communities want us to do for them and not what we want to
do’’.
Commenting on the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, the NNPC GMD noted that to
achieve quick passge of the bill, it is crucial to isolate the fiscal
regime from the current draft and move quickly to work on other pressing
aspects of the proposed oil reform legislation.
He re-iterated that the Corporation under his watch is rigorously
executing “20 Fixes” project which identified 20 critical issues that need
to be addressed in order to re-position the 37 years old national oil
corporation on the track of efficiency and profitability.
The target include: Reduce and audit cost, restructure corporate centre
and staffing, renegotiate existing contracts, including PSCs, streamline
subsidy management, boost pipeline security, enhance transparency and
accountability, achieving zero tolerance for corruption, rebrand NNPP and
unbundle PPMC.
Other initiatives include: Unbundling of the Nigerian Gas Company, reduce
contracting Cycle, restructure refineries, improve information technology
to drive business, embed staff and business performance management,
restructure JV funding and reduce Cash Call, improve retail profitability
, deploy and attract focused investments, re-kit NPDC, expand crude
marketing and generate power profitability.