The National Assembly has moved the passage of the other three versions of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) to the first quarter of 2018.
Apart from the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill (PIGB) that was passed by the Senate, there are three others, namely: Petroleum Industry Administration Bill that is on licensing; Petroleum Industry Fiscal Bill that deals with the fiscal terms and the Host Community Trust Bill that takes care of communities that oil exploration impacts negatively.
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Upstream, Tayo Alasoadura, who spoke at the on-going 7th Practical Nigeria Content organised by the Nigeria Content and Development Monitoring Board (NCDMB) in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, said the need to expedite action on the 2018 budget proposal necessitated the shift in date for passage of the PIB from end of 2017 as earlier projected to first quarter of next year (2018).
“We were thinking that we can pass the PIB before the end of the year but with the presentation of the budget to the National Assembly by the President and challenging the lawmakers to pass the proposals before the end of the year, it will be difficult to have enough time to work on the PIB,” he said.
Alasoadura, who agreed that the non-passage of the PIB had led to uncertainties in the oil and gas sector, hinted that the breaking of the PIB into four parts was done to allow for easy amendments in the future.
Meanwhile, Wabote has said that the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu and his team would, in the next few days, embark on a mission to the Niger Delta to talk about what government has done to address some of the issues that were raised during the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo’s visit to the region.
The NCDMB boss stated that finding solution to the joint cash call by the government had helped to boost confidence among the International Oil Companies (IOCs) that Nigeria has the capacity to find solutions to most of the challenges confronting the oil and gas industry.
