Hurdles Buhari Must Scale As Oil Minister

• Experts Warn Of Pitfalls Ahead
• Africa Heads Nowhere Without Power, Says Adesina, AfDB Boss

FIRST was the disclosure that he would be Minister of Petroleum Resources. This was followed by a clarification that he actually meant ‘supervision’ of the Ministry. But whatever oversight President Muhammadu Buhari intends for the nation’s cash cow, experts say success lies with taking a few right steps.

Meanwhile, regardless of the measures African countries put in place to confront economic and developmental shocks, the continent might make no headway until the challenge of inadequate energy supply is resolved, says President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina.

Buhari would be the wiser to unbundle the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) currently “stranded” in the National Assembly, because the Bill is central to restructuring in the oil industry, argued former Legal Counsel, Commonwealth Secretariat, London, Professor Ibibia Worika.

According to Worika, the Bill is both bulky and extremely complex, and should never have stomached everything about the industry in one piece of legislation. “And because everything was consolidated in one bill, a whole lot of reform that could have taken place in the oil industry are now stuck. If you are consolidating so many things, so long as the Bill has not been passed into law, every other thing stands in abeyance. I don’t think we have that luxury of time. The delay is costing us investment opportunities. It is showing investors and the entire world that we are indecisive; we are slow, and that nothing is happening in the sector,” he said.

Explaining further why government must move urgently on the matter of the Bill in order to checkmate lack of investment, Prof. Worika said: “As an investor, you are operating under a very uncertain environment; you don’t know what laws are going to apply to you. There are several versions of this Bill. You only need to go to the Internet to check. I don’t even know the most current version. And then apart from that, would you want to put down substantial capital? You cannot take that kind of risk. We have an environment that is most uncertain and certainty is the lifeblood of investment and transactions. No one wants to make investment decision for 10, 15, 20 years on account of an environmental condition that is just most uncertain. It cannot work. So, I have no doubt in my mind that that is one of the reason we are not having sufficient investment in Nigeria.”

One pitfall Buhari would have to avoid is failure to strike appropriate balance between professionalism and politicisation in choice of the sector’s managers. Recall that recent appointments to some key government positions had generated huge uproar with many Nigerians accusing the President of favouring a section of the country. “I know that our Constitution talks about Federal Character. But I also know that this is an industry described as specialist. You cannot just put somebody there because the person is from a particular part of the country. They need to have a minimum qualification and experience. But most importantly, I think this government should not be seen as interfering unduly with the Nigerian National Petroleum Commission (NNPC).”

Oil and gas sector consultant, Mr. Ademola Oshodi, reiterated Worika’s caution on the need to prioritise professionalism. “It is too big and staffing is not done on merit,” he said of the NNPC, adding: “It is based on Federal Character, man-know-man, nepotism. You can’t have that in a functioning and vital organisation that is so crucial to the Nigerian economy. You need transparency; people with qualification to run it. Of course, because it is government, you have to put everybody from different parts of the country, but that affects performance. If it is eventually unbundled, we should have qualified people from the private sector to manage it.”

With a history of corruption trailing NNPC operations, “strong institutions are required to ensure that the right things are not only done but that they are done irrespective of who occupies the office,” said President of African Network of Environmental Humanities, Dr. John Agbonifo.

He added: “Officials of the organisation need mental mobilisation to see that they are engaged in a committed fight to achieve set national goals. To that end, they must be trained to understand what the national problems are, what is responsible, what the solutions are, why the problem must be solved, and how to go about solving them.

“Moreover, they need to be trained to understand the ethics of bureaucratic organisations. Part of the training must emphasise the sociological insight that relationships in the bureaucracy, and the latter’s interactions with its environment must be based on contractual obligations and not communal sentiments. Relationships are based on rules. Flouting of the rules carry consequences regardless of what the offender is to powerful individuals in or outside the organisation.”