The Joint Committee tasked with reviewing the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill (PIGB) in the Senate has laid its report before the house. This signifies the completion of the Committee’s review process. The next step is the clause by clause debate of the Bill at its third hearing, currently scheduled for the 25th of April, 2017. This is a landmark in the long history of Nigeria’s petroleum industry reform process, as it is the first time that the Senate has debated the Bill at this level. We applaud the proactive steps taken by the Senate leadership and the leaders of the Joint Committee to get to this stage.

What to watch out for

The key platforms for the PIGB were:

1. identification of the government roles across the sector;
2. a separation of government roles to avoid conflicts of interests;
3. the creation of an independent and well funded regulatory agency.

We will be reviewing the Joint Committee report when made available to make sure that the Joint Committee has adhered to these principles.

Next Steps

The PIGB report will be debated by the Senate on the 25th of April, 2017 and if passed by that body, it will then be forwarded to the House of Representatives, where it may be adopted by that House or go through a similar process of passage. Subsequently, the Bill will be forwarded to the President for assent.

We understand that work is already ongoing on the fiscal and operational elements of the reform process.