At least four African countries have gone ahead to enact their Petroleum Industry Bills into law in their various ahead of Nigeria.
Despite the fact that Nigeria initiated the bill ahead of most African countries, the PIBhas not been passed by the national assembly..
The African countries that have passed the PIB into law ,according to Dr Adeoful Adefulu, a barrister and petroleum industry expert, include Ghana,Uganda,Tanzania and Mozambique.While Nigerian government ‘slept’ on the PIB issue,these countries went ahead to pass theirs into law, Adefulu said.
Photo above: The list of countries ahead of Nigeria on PIB courtesy of Adefulu’s slide
He made this assertion in Abuja on Wednesday during a roundtable on Petroleum Industry Bill organized by CISLAC at Transcorp Hilton.
Speaking on the matter a member of the House of Reps said some of the countries mentioned aboveactually came to get the draft copies of PIB from Nigeria and went ahead to adopt them to suit their local needs.
Also, addressing the participants Israel Aye a lawyer and another petroleum industry expert said it was better to always have laws in place to stimulate investment. A bad law he noted is not the worst situation from an investor’s point of view.Aye said absence of law to guide any sector fuels uncertainty.Nobody can model uncertainty, he said.
He noted that right from the day it was announced that the petroleum sector law would be changed, a vacuum has been created.No investor likes such uncertainty.Hence the need to urgently pass the PIB.
In his welcome address, Auwalu Ibrahim Musa Rafsanjani,executive director of CISLAC said “The Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB remains the most talked about topic in the oil and gas industry to date. Whereas everyone agrees that this law is necessary and indeed indispensable for any meaningful reforms to take place in the sector, it has remained elusive and is yet to be passed into law after over 12 years when it was first conceived. This is in spite of commitments made by previous governments and expressed commitments both by the executive and legislature. Indeed this administration during its campaign promised to pass it within the first few months if elected.
“The National Assembly has also severally committed to the passage of the PIB. So far the Senate has passed the PIGB, which is just a component of the PIB. The House of Representatives currently has three Bills making up the PIB which has passed second reading.
“With obvious decline in the oil and gas sector, recurrent instances of corruption, divestment of interest by International Oil Companies, losses of revenue amounting to about $200 Billion ( according to the NEITI) in investment and falling reserves, the time for the passage of all the versions of the PIB is now, if Nigeria must be taken seriously.S
“It is for this reason that CISLAC and other partners, with support for FOSTER, are initiating a campaign for the passage of this all important law. This Roundtable is one in series of activities to support this very strategic House Committee to make history by ensuring its passage.”
