QUICK FACTS
The PIGB is the culmination of almost two decades of work by various stakeholders in the Nigerian petroleum industry. It is the first of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) split by the current National Assembly (NASS) into four. • It was passed by both chambers, a joint committee of the NASS harmonised the bill on March 31, 2018 and the harmonized copy was then transmitted to the president for assent on April 25, 2018 • The bill when it becomes an Act will give clear demarcation of institutional roles in industry governance with respect to policy institutions - commercial and regulatory institutions. • Stakeholders agree that the battle to the transformation of oil and gas governance in Nigeria does not just end with presidential assent to the bill, in fact, that is when the story begins. • There is now widespread advocacy by civil society groups and well-meaning Nigerians for the president to immediately sign the bill because the long delay in passing it had cost the country enormous fortunes. • In 2013, then Country Chair of Shell Companies in Nigeria, Mutiu Sunmonu, said their upstream exploration and production arm, SPDC, put on hold investment decisions on two key offshore oil and gas projects that would have cost about $30 billion until the new petroleum law was approved. • Two years later, chairman of the Petroleum Technology Association of Nigeria (PETAN), Bank Anthony Okoroafor, estimated that Nigeria lost $10 billion (N1.7 trillion) fresh investments due to the non-passage of the PIB. The Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) in a policy brief later that year put annual losses due to the non-passage of the bill at $200 billion. The brief also alerted that another $15 billion is lost yearly in fresh investments to regulatory uncertainties. • The Energy Information Administration, the statistical arm of the US Energy Department, in one of its report said, “The amount of money that Nigeria loses every year from not passing the PIB is estimated to be as high as $15 billion.” • GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company, said in a new report that the delay in the passage of the PIB was threatening an average capital expenditure of $8.4bn per year expected to be spent on 249 oil and gas fields in Nigeria between 2018 and 2020. • Buhari currently doubles as petroleum minister and experts said if the harmonised version of the bill sent to him is anything to go by, the intent of the PIGB is to whittle down the power of the petroleum minister thereby limiting him mostly to policy making while empowering the petroleum agencies. • The Energy and Natural Resource Partner, Streamsowers and Kohn, Chigozie Hilary-Nwokonko, said the bill if assented to, means that the president who doubles as minister of petroleum resources will no longer have powers to grant key authorisations like discretionary award of oil and gas licenses and permits. It means Buhari cannot arbitrarily fire any of the oil agency heads and most importantly • The President Nigeria Association for Energy Economics (NAEE), Prof Wumi Iledare, also said there were still some safeguards for the president. “The president has the right to review the PIGB before accenting to it for areas that may not be in tune with his policy objectives for the sector. But will Buhari consider national interest and the citizenry as bigger than individual benefit and therefore prove everyone wrong and sign the PIGB? • Buhari should sign the bill because his government has shown clear signs of commitment towards a private sector market-led economy. “Secondly, it is also a bragging right; if the president signs. It fits into the campaign tool box of what he has achieved,” said Dr. Amadi, an oil industry expert