The Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Gbenga Komolafe, has reiterated the commission’s commitment to creating enabling environment for growth and investment in the nation’s upstream industry.
Komolafe made this commtment during the 2nd phase of consultation with stakehoders on draft regulations in Abuja.
He said towards this end the commission is making efforts to ensure that regulations and key policies neccisitated by the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) are developed and gazatted as quickly as possible.
He recalled that the commission presented six drafts regulations for discussion during the 1st phase iof the consultantation in April this year.
“The inputs of the stakeholders from the engagement were incorporated, where necessary, in the draft regulations. Thereafter, the regulations were forwarded to the Honourable Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice for vetting, legislative standardisation, and approval. I am pleaseed to inform you that one of the regulations, the Nigerian Petroleum Upstream Petroleum Host Community Development Trust regulations has been gazetted while the remaining five have been finalized and ready for gazetting,” he disclosed.
According to the Chief Executive Officer, in furtherance of the above, and in compliance of the PIA, this 2nd phase is yet another stakeholders’ discussion to finalize some draft regulations.
Among the draft regulations presented, include Acreage Management (Drilling & Production) Regulations, Upstream Petroleum Environmental Regulations, Upstream Petroleum Environmental Remediation Fund
Regulations, Upstream Petroleum Safety Regulations.
Others include Unitization Regulations, Upstream Petroleum Decommissioning & Abandonment
Regulations, and Frontier Exploration Fund Regulations
“Please permit me to reiterate that the process of formulating the above regulations has been a rigorous and strenuous exercise. They are products of critical thinking and evaluation, and hard work by the
Commission’s Regulation development Team and the Presidential Implementation Committee on PIA. Despite this however, the process is
not complete until the Stakeholders’ critical inputs are obtained, discussed, and incorporated, where necessary, in the Regulations.
“To this end, I am of the firm view that with the level of turn out today, we will have healthy, robust, and intellectual discussion on the Regulations during the syndicate sessions to come out with robust regulations with best international best standard.
“In conclusion, this phase in our regulations development is by no means a final or exhaustive one in our drive to support the upstream industry operators. The Commission will continue to embark on programmes and policies that will create enabling environment for growth and more investments in the Nigerian upstream oil and gas sector. Therefore, we look forward to more engagements with key stakeholders like your good selves. I sincerely wish you happy and fruitful deliberations throughout the event,” Komolafe summed.
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