Don’t scare investors with stringent legislations, ex-minister tells N/Assembly

A former Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Odein Ajumogobia, yesterday cautioned the National Assembly against scaring investors away with stringent provisions in the proposed legislations on local content.

Ajumogobia gave the warning on Thursday in Abuja during his paper presentation at a virtual Local Content Summit organised by the National Assembly joint Committees on Local Content.

The

summit

x-rayed the short and long term implications of the Nigeria Oil and Gas Industry Content Development Act 2010 (Amendment) Bill 2020 (SB.417), the Nigerian Local Content Enforcement Bill 2020 (SB. 419) and the Nigerian Oil and Gas Industry Content Act, 2020 (Repeal and Re-enactment) Bill 2020 (SB. 420).

Ajumogobia said legislations for effective implementation of local content policy in Nigeria were very important, but stringent provisions should be avoided not to scare away investors.

He said, “If the targets in the proposed legislation are too high then they may scare away investments or investors.”

The Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission, Umar Danbatta, warned that imposing multiple taxes on the telecom operators might adversely affect the National Broadband Plan 2020 - 2025.

“If we are introducing new taxes, courtesy of the bills, we will be passing the burden on the end users because they will end up paying more for data,” Danbatta said.