House of Representatives has on Thursday, arrived at a unanimous decision to form an Adhoc committee that will carefully look into the alleged N59 trillion oil deal, involving the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Allison-Madueke, Shell Petroleum Limited, Nigerian Petroleum Development Company,NPDC, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation,NNPC, Atlantic Energy Drilling Concept Limited and Septa Energy Limited.
The decision was made after a motion sponsored by Victor Ogene was deliberated upon. The motion was connected to a protest by some oil producing communities in Delta State last week.
Arguing in support of his position, Hon. Ogene observed that representatives of oil producing ethnic nationalities in Delta State protested the alleged fraudulent allocations of some marginal oil fields at the premises of the National Assembly on Thursday, April 25, 2013.
In his claim, the Federal Government would have realized $800 million instead of the $50 million it received, if they had considered the open competitive bidding as specified by section 16 of the Public Procurement Act, 2007.
“More disturbing is that the alleged resultant part-sum of $750 million in the entire racket or fraud scheme became possible through a mischievous process of hinging the transaction on the “Strategic Alliance Agreement – an action which was deliberately designed to circumvent due process and transparency in contravention of section 3 of the Nigeria Extractive industry Transparent Initiative,NEITI, Act, 2005, the Public Procurement Act and the Nigerian oil and Gas Industry Content Act (No 2) 2010.
“The protesters complained of the secret and arbitrary farm-out of the Oil Mining Leases (OMLs) 4, 26, 30, 34, 38, 41 and 42 to both Atlantic Energy Drilling Concept Ltd and Septa Energy Ltd, without regard to the law and due process.
“We are however aware that the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Shell Petroleum Development Company,SPDC, Ltd, compromised officials of the Ministry of Petroleum Resources and the Nigerian Petroleum Development Corporation ,NPDC-a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation ,NNPC- were allegedly accused of impropriety, abuse of due process and fraud in the transactions leading to the farm-out of the said oil blocks.
“In addition, it was also known that a colossal sum of $380 billion or about N59 trillion, and $15.72 trillion worth of gas asset were alleged to be at stake in the shady deal. In perpetrating the deal, it was alleged that there was a deliberate exclusion of indigenous operators from exercising their rights of first consideration or refusal, in violation of sections 3(1, 2) and 5 of the Nigerian Oil and Gas Industry Content Act (No 2), 2010, which action obviated the need for an open and competitive bidding in favour of Atlantic Energy Drilling Concept Ltd, which neither tendered nor bidded for the blocks allocated to it.
“The House is concerned with the need to discharge its constitutional responsibility under section 88(lb) and (2b) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, as amended, which requires the House to conduct an investigation into the public affairs of any person, authority, Ministry or government department for the purpose of exposing corruption, inefficiency or waste in the execution or administration of laws, and being mindful of the weighty accusations being made in this instance.” He had argued.
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