{"id":18231,"date":"2018-04-13T18:34:09","date_gmt":"2018-04-13T18:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=18231"},"modified":"2018-04-13T18:34:09","modified_gmt":"2018-04-13T18:34:09","slug":"dont-sign-pigb-bill-niger-delta-stakeholders-tell-buhari","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=18231","title":{"rendered":"DON&#8217;T SIGN PIGB BILL &#8211; NIGER DELTA STAKEHOLDERS TELL BUHARI"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><code><script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!-- www.deltanewsroom.com --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-2163942495525027\" data-ad-slot=\"1411897411\" data-ad-format=\"auto\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/code><\/p>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Stakeholders in Niger Delta have urged President Muhammad Buhari not to sign the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill (PIGB) because its intent is the privatisation of the country\u2019s oil and gas resources by vested interest.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">They also warned that if the bill is signed into law by the President, derivation accruable to oil-producing states will be drastically diminished and might trigger off a new wave of unrest in the Niger Delta.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">A former Group General Manager, Upstream Investment Division of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Dr. Joseph Ellah, in a paper titled \u201cImplication of the new PIGB for Nigeria, Niger Delta and the common man,\u201d which he presented at the University of Port Harcourt, Claude Ake School of Government yesterday, urged the President to be weary of the bill because no oil producing country has ever privatised its oil and gas resources which the bill tends to achieve.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Ellah said that the proposed creation of a National Petroleum Company had been designed by the National Assembly to pave way for the country\u2019s assets to be transferred to one or two individuals who have what it takes to approach the stock exchange for the purpose of buying the oil and gas assets which was originally owned by the people of Niger Delta.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">According to him, similar attempts had been made in the past to appropriate the oil resources through the leasing of assets and contract\/asset management Degree of 1995; vision 2010, NAPIMS ltd, PIB and NNPC Ltd.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.alternativeadvert.com\/show.php?z=30&amp;pl=15958&amp;ad_type=59&amp;rl=180\" width=\"300\" height=\"250\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Ellah warned that if the president signs the bill to law, the country will suffer a major blow as it would be denied of profit of oil and gas sold, as it will now merely rely on petroleum product tax and royalty due to the fact that the country no longer has participatory interests.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">He stated that with the divestment of the oil and gas reserves, there would be no need for the other sections of the Petroleum Industry Bill or even discussion on restructuring the oil sector.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">According to him, the ultimate aim of the lawmakers was to destroy the NNPC, sell off the oil and gas reserves to a few Nigerians and foreigners, and then leave the people of the Niger Delta and the rest of ordinary Nigerians to wallop in abject poverty.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Ellah also faulted the so-called incorporation of the Nigeria petroleum liability management company because it was an aberration, noting that this section was added to the bill by the lawmakers to ensure that the buyers of the oil and gas assets under privatisation do not have any liabilities.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Director of the Claude Ake School of Government, Prof. Eme Ekekwe, said a thorough analysis of the bill clearly reveals that the people of the Niger Delta and the entire nation would be further impoverished for the benefit of those who want to capture the Nigerian state.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">He called for the commercialisation of the NNPC and its subsidiaries, which will in turn totally eliminate political interference and nepotism.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Similarly, Dr. Sofiri Peterside warned that if the bill is signed, the economic landscape of Nigeria, particularly the Niger Delta, will witness major destabilising tremor and can easily tilt over. (GUARDIAN)<a href=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/PIB.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-18232\" src=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/PIB.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"461\" height=\"319\" srcset=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/PIB.jpg 461w, http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/PIB-300x208.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 461px) 100vw, 461px\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Stakeholders in Niger Delta have urged President Muhammad Buhari not to sign the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill (PIGB) because its intent is the privatisation of the country\u2019s oil and gas resources by vested interest. They also warned that if the bill is signed into law by the President, derivation accruable to oil-producing states will be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":18232,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[4585,4583,338,4582,4584],"class_list":["post-18231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national","tag-dr-sofiri-peterside","tag-joseph-ellah","tag-nnpc","tag-petroleum-industry-governance-bill","tag-prof-eme-ekekwe"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/PIB.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-4K3","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18231"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18231\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18233,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18231\/revisions\/18233"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}