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Yesterday, the 28th of June 2017, Nigeria’s Federal Executive Council approved the new National Gas Policy. The focus of the policy is to provide an enabling environment for the development of natural gas resources across the value chain. We shall publish a copy of the final document on petroleumindustrybill.com once it is released.
The Nation reports that the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (“NEITI”) has revealed that the Senate has made a fundamental error in the PIGB by failing to “enshrine NEITI principles in the governance process”. Continue reading “NEITI reveals “fundamental error” in PIGB”
Thisdayonline reports that the House of Representatives seeks to pursue another strategy in the passage of petroleum industry reforms. The Chairman of the House Committee, Petroleum Upstream, Hon. Victor Nwokolo (Delta-PDP) indicated in a press conference yesterday that the House bill will include the Petroleum Host Community Fund as well as Fiscal reform matters. This runs against the reports that the PIGB passed by the Senate would be given accelerated hearing by the House.
Given the legislative and political timetables, this recent development will pose a challenge to the adoption of the PIGB or indeed any part of the petroleum industry reforms into law in the near future. It is our opinion that the two houses of the National Assembly should work together in the national interest to avoid further delays to much-needed reforms.
The newspapers continue to cover the fallout from the passage of the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill (PIGB). A few of yesterday’s reports are highlighted below.
YNaija.com publish a scathing opinion piece by Saatah Nubari titled “THE TRASH THAT IS THE PETROLEUM INDUSTRY BILL (PIB)“. Nubari criticised the decision of the Senate not to address the Petroleum Host Community Fund first as in his opinion this is the most critical piece of the raft of legislation to be passed.
The Premium Times provides us with an infograph detailing the decade long journey in the passage of the Petroleum reform bill.
Thisday considers the passage of the bill a small but significant step in the right direction.
Proshareng.com provides a detailed analysis of the contents of the bill, which is worth reading.
Since its passage last week, the PIGB has dominated Nigerian newspapers. See a cross-section of some of the articles below.
The Daily Trust in its article – The next big hurdle for PIB – highlights some of the challenges before the PIGB finally becomes law. The article suggests that the Bill may be given accelerated consideration by the House of Representatives.
The Vanguard interviews experts on the passage of the PIGB.
In Oil Workers Commend the Passage of the PIB, the Guardian reports on comments by the leadership of PENGASSAN welcoming the passage of the Bill by the Senate and seeking early passage of the other elements of petroleum industry reform.
A copy of the PIGB 2017 may be found here. The Bill is in a report format and shows the changes made to the Bill after the Joint Committee’s review.
This post has been updated with a link to the final version of the Bill.
The presentation given by the Senate Committees on Petroleum Resources (Upstream), Downstream Petroleum Sector and Gas Resources may be found below.