Matters of disputes have been hampering the effective utilisation of the host community development funds, which was estimated at N200 billion by the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC).

The Chief Executive of NUPRC, Gbenga Komolafe, has disclosed that N60 billion was raised in local currency, and $100 million was facilitated in foreign currency for host communities, which translates to about N200 billion due to the current exchange rate.

He mentioned that the fund has been unutilised due to various disputes and litigations; hence, his consideration for the creation of an Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) centre for amicable settlement instead of going through the rigour and long process of the courts.

The commission also inaugurated the body of Neutrals of its ADR centre, where he pointed out that one of the challenges in the country’s upstream is the kind of hostility between host communities and the oil companies, which, according to him, has been limiting the nation’s optimisation of the abundant oil and gas reserves.

Komolafe said: “Host community issues have, in a way, made it not conducive for us to have the desired operating environment; but good enough that the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) has robustly provided for dealing with host community issues by the introduction of the Host Community Development Trust.

“Yes, we put in place the host community regulation and we have made efforts to implement this effectively. Of course, part of the gains is that, as we speak, we’ve attracted about N60 billion, that is the naira part, and about $100 million, that is on the dollar side, into these host community development trust accounts. If you gross that by today’s exchange rate, you realise that that will almost be close to N200 billion altogether.”