The ongoing nationwide engagement with the oil, gas and mining companies is to sensitise them on the templates designed for the exercise, the Executive Secretary of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), Orji Ogbonnaya Orji, has said.
Orji who spoke in Port Harcourt while declaring open the nationwide sensitization workshops on the conduct of the 2022-2023 industry reports of the oil, gas and mining sectors for companies in the South-South and South-East Zones said the exercise is also to sensitize stakeholders on the scope of the annual audit report and the data and information expected from covered entities from the process.
The NEITI Chief Executive said the focus of the engagement, which was also to establish public revenue flows through investments among the major players in the oil, gas and mining sectors towards domestic resource mobilization became a key part of NEITI mandates to enthrone transparency and accountability driven by public disclosure and blocking leakages.
The sensitization workshops, which began in Lagos last week continued in Port Harcourt to acquaint the agencies and companies covered by the audit report in the affected States in the South-South and South-East zones with the templates designed for the exercise.
The NEITI Executive Secretary explained that the nationwide workshops were in line with the principles and standards of the global Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI).
“The objectives of these industry reports are to establish and make public revenue flows through investment among the major players in the oil, gas and mining sectors, examine the financial, physical and process issues from within and among the companies and relevant government agencies”. Orji noted.
“The report will, specifically, undertake special verification and validation of information and data on the payments made by the companies to government entities as well as government receipts. Other areas will include quantities and volume of crude produced, balances payable or receivable on certain financial transactions, taxes, royalties on project-by-project basis, social contributions and investment flows in Nigeria’s oil and gas industry”, he added.
Similarly, Orji said the 2022-2023 Solid Minerals Industry Audit report would disclose data and information on quantities of solid minerals mined, quarried, processed, exported and imported, as well as track the extractive industries sector funds collected by various government agencies to the Federation Account and reconcile the payments made by major players (companies/entities) to government in the sector during the period under review.
These payments and receipts, he said, were in the form of Royalty, Ground Rents/Annual Surface Rents, Taxation, Levies etc., adding that regular extractive industry reports were some of the core statutory mandates of NEITI.
Under Section 2 of the NEITI Act, 2007, NEITI is charged with the responsibility of ensuring due process, transparency in the payments made by all extractive industry companies to the Federal Government, monitor and ensure accountability in the revenue receipts of Federal Government from extractive industry companies, among others.
Orji highlighted NEITI’s new sets of templates designed to capture the new requirements as expected by the EITI, including mainstreaming, disclosure of covered entities’ anti-corruption policies and practices, threshold for reporting beneficial owners, Nigeria’s energy transition policies, carbon pricing and subsidies and its effect on government revenues.
Other areas to be covered by the reports include disclosures on environment, social and gender impact assessments of extractive activities and employment data in the industry.
The Executive Secretary assured of NEITI’s commitment to work closely with the companies and government under the EITI framework to create good business environment that encourages the inflow of more foreign direct investments into the extractive sector.
For this to happen, the Executive Secretary “encouraged all companies to embrace transparency, accountability and corporate social responsibility in conformity with the EITI standards in other to build the confidence of investment partners”.
“Let me also inform you that this templates workshop will be followed immediately with the NEITI-Companies Forum engagement. The Miners’ Association and the Oil Producers Trade Section (OPTS) of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) reached a consensus to strengthen and deepen their involvement in the EITI process.
“They have demonstrated this commitment by participating physically and being present at all NEITI events in the past eight months”. Orji said, adding that the Federal Government has also acknowledged this commitment and endorsed it, by including the two industry representatives as members of the newly constituted NEITI Board.
This, he said, was in a bid to address the global EITI validation assessment on industry engagement which the EITI advised Nigeria to improve upon”.
He appealed to all government agencies as well as extractive industry companies covered by the audit reports to fully cooperate with the process as required by Law and within the timelines set for the completion of the exercise.
“I also wish to call on the media, civil society and other relevant stakeholders to help sensitize Nigerians on the importance of this report with a view to mobilizing support for the exercise. It is our belief that the next round of reports, which is currently underway and would be ready by Sept. 2024, would provide clear indicators on the level of progress and impact of the implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) in the oil and gas industry and the solid minerals road map”. Dr. Orji reaffirmed.
He reiterated NEITI commitment to open up engagements with the National Assembly to track the implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA), which aligns strongly with the objectives of NEITI in the oil and gas industry to sanitize the sector and institutionalise a regime of transparency, accountability, efficiency and productivity, aligning the industry with global standards and best practices. NEITI has remained at the forefront of the advocacy for this to happen.” Dr. Orji maintained.
The theme for the 2022-2023 oil and gas report is “Impact of the PIA on domestic resource mobilisation”, while that of the solid minerals is “Unleashing potentials of the solid mineral sector: assessing the Nigeria mining roadmap”. These themes, Dr. Orji explained are to review and assess the progress and impact made so far in the implementation of these laudable policies and Law.
The workshops were attended by more than 200 representatives of the covered entities, among them, the representatives of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited; Nigerian Midstream, Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA), Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited, Seplat Energy, Julius Berger, Dangote Cement, Lafarge and other companies.
