Federal Government of Nigeria to Split Its National Petroleum Corporation into 30 Firms Next Week

Dr. Ibe Kachukwu- Minister of State Petroleum Resources, Nigeria.

According to the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources and Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu,the Federal Government will next week announce a major overhaul of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation as well as the firm’s unbundling into 30 different companies.

According to Kachukwu, the government has started resolving the governance issues in the oil and gas sector, adding that an overhaul had not happened at the corporation in the past 20 years.

Kachikwu, who disclosed this at the Society of Petroleum Engineers’ Oloibiri Lecture Series in Abuja on Thursday, also stated that the latest financial report of the NNPC for the month of January showed that the corporation’s losses had reduced from the over N160bn of some six months ago to about N3bn.

Explaining the restructuring by the Federal Government in the oil sector, the minister said, “We are starting first with simple governance issues; those that are not contentious, that are very rapid and that deal a lot with the transformation of the national oil company.

“For the national oil company, a lot of work is going on; I am sure some of you have seen the effects; but within the next one week, we are going to be announcing some real major overhaul of the system, one that hasn’t been done in over 20 years.”