Unbundling: Senate Absolves NNPC GMD, Kachikwu, Of Illegality

The Senate Committees on Petroleum Downstream and Gas have absolved the Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Dr Ibe Kachikwu, of any wrong doing in his recent restructuring of the state oil company.
The Committees gave Mister Kachikwu a clean bill at a meeting in Abuja on Thursday.

They, however, queried him for not consulting with stakeholders in the sector and the National Assembly before announcing the restructuring of the oil corporation.

Mr Kachikwu had announced the creation of seven operational units in the NNPC.

Dr Kachikwu said that five of the seven operational units would be strictly business-driven in line with global best practices.

However, following that pronouncement, oil workers shut down the operations of the NNPC nationwide causing uneasiness and discontent in the oil and gas sector.

Dr Kachikwu denied ‘unbundling’ the NNPC, maintaining that the oil company was only ‘reorganised’.

He said NNPC had five business entities – upstream, downstream, refineries, gas and power – with focus on business and that they were there before.

He announced the creation of seven sub divisions, debunking reports that NNPC will be unbundled into 30 subsidiaries.

Dr. Kachikwu said the NNPC will be broken into upstream, downstream, refineries, gas and power, ventures, finance and corporate services.

He said on Wednesday that five of the units would be focused purely on business ventures and profit making while two would handle service delivery.

The Petroleum Minister said that the objections raised by the Oil and Gas Union over lack of consultation, is not necessary as the process is still in the initial stage and consultations would begin when the break-down commences.

He said that seven names of top management staff of the corporation have been penned down to serve as Chief Executive Officers of the seven divisions, most of whom are currently administrative heads of departments in the Corporation.

The Committees advised the NNPC Group Managing Director to continue to consult with industry stakeholders going forward, to avoid pitfalls in the restructuring exercise in the future.

Culled from Channels TV