NNPC applauds Buhari’s choice of new NEITI CEO, Orjit

TH E N I G E R I A NATIONAL Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has welcomed the appointment of Orji Ogbonnaya Orji as the executive secretary of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), the national oil giant said in a statement.

Kennie Obateru, NNPC spokesman, in a statement quoted Mele Kyari, the group managing director, as applauding President Muhammadu Buhari for the decision to appoint Orji, PhD, as the NEITI executive secretary. He is expected to engender massive reforms currently in progress in the Nigerian oil and gas industry.

Kyari described Orji, a former broadcaster with Radio Nigeria, as a competent technocrat, an EITI expert and resource governance professional, who has been deeply involved in NEITI and NNPC engagements on reforms of the oil and gas industry over the past decade.

Orji, until his appointment, was NEITI’s director of communications and advocacy. He began his career at the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN), and also worked with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) where he managed several donor-funded projects. He holds an MSc degree and PhD in Political Economy and International Development from the University of Abuja.

NEITI was established in 2004 as the key anti-corruption agency over-sighting Nigeria’s extractive industries sector. It is domiciled at the presidency responsible for enthroning transparency, accountability and governance of the country’s oil, gas and mining industries.

The NNPC boss noted that as a supporting company of the EITI at the international level, it (NNPC) was ready to sustain its collaboration with NEITI under Orji’s leadership in the key areas of the agency’s industry audit process, exchange of information and data, commodity trading, contract transparency, beneficial ownership, mainstreaming and overall oil and gas industry reforms under the EITI/ NEITI framework.