Group calls for petroleum minister’s sack

Irked by the statement credited to the Minister of State for Petreoleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, the Accountable leadership for Better Nigeria Initiative (ALBNI), Sunday called on President Muhammadu Buhari to sack the minister.

Executive Director, ALBNI, Remi Adebayo in a statement in Abuja said: “Our attention has been drawn to the statement credited to Mr. Timipre Sylva, Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, published in Vanguard Newspaper of Thursday 17 October 2019 on ‘why FG

can’t recover $62 Billion from International Oil Companies.’ While answering questions from State House correspondents at the end of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari, the Bayelsa born Mr Sylva was reported to have

said referring to the duly calculated $62 billion, now owed to Nigeria by the oil companies,

‘Let us consider that as a lost opportunity, the money was not in a

cupboard, they have taken it. Nobody can bring out that kind of money. I

mean we can’t get $62 billion (sic).”

Adebayo argued that If the above statement was indeed made by Mr. Timipre Sylva, then Mr. President ought to relieve him of his duties forthwith as Nigeria’s Minister of State For Petroleum Resources. “It is unbecoming of a minister to assume the role of the mouthpiece and insider representative of the oil companies against the economic development of Nigeria and against the federal government’s fight against corruption and economic sabotage.

“Since 2003 when the price of crude oil exceeded $20 per barrel, real terms, the oil companies involved in deep offshore contracts with the federal government represented by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) have plundered Nigeria’s economy by surreptitiously colluding with regulatory insiders in the oil and gas industry to avoid adjusting the share of the federation in the additional revenue accruing under the production sharing contracts all through the years and up till today.

Leave a Reply