NEITI makes commitment to play leadership roles in implementation of Nigeria's energy transition plan

Oredola Adeola

The Nigerian Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) has promised to provide the much-needed leadership in the implementation of Nigeria’s Energy Transition Plan(ETP).

Dr. Orji Orji, Executive Secretary, NEITI, made this known on Tuesday during the Civil Society Organisations (CSO) and media engagement on Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) validation.

EnergyDay gathered that the engagement took place on the backdrop of the EITI validation, coming up in January 2023. The validation is conducted every three years is a quality assurance mechanism to ascertain level of compliance and progress in implementing its standards among member countries, including Nigeria.

According to him, Dr. Orji is ready to support the Energy Transition Plan(ETP) with content, information, and data.

He noted that the ETP was launched without specifying the organisation that should be held accountable in circumstance that things go wrong.

He said, “NEITI will provide the content, information, and data to support the energy plan that the Nigerian Government has launched.

“The inter-ministerial energy transition implementation working group will need to collaborate with the Civil Society Organisation(CSO). The roles of all the major drivers should be clearly spelt out. What will be the role of people who are neither in government nor within the corridor of power and yet energy transition affects their lives?

“That is why the road map that we are developing is specific and precise on who is to do what, how the opportunities can be maximised and specific benefits of the transition to Nigerians, when it is finally happening?.

“The Government has the over years, developed an energy transition road map without pre-empting the challenges that may limit the actualisation of the plan. Nigeria’s peculiar circumstance has to be put into the whole scheme.

The NEITI recommended that Nigeria needs leadership in the transition framework, that would independently fast-track the entire process. There are a lot of jobs that needed to be done, our people have a way of making things happen if offered the right incentive. The road map should be specific, about who is going to carry the burden of implementation.

Dr. Orji also noted that the agency has assisted Nigeria in the recovery of about N2.6 trillion as outstanding revenue from major oil companies operating in the country following its intervention. He added that the oil companies are still owing a total of $2.6 billion outstanding as at March 2022.

Dr Orji noted that the debt recovery was achieved against the backdrop of NEITI’s financial report.

He said, “By the time we release the 2021 report, any company owning Nigeria will have no choice but to invite EFCC to take over and handle it as an economic crime,” he said.

Dr. Orji said that the recovery was a result of NEITI’s appearance at the National Assembly to defend its position based on data it provided.

According to Orji, as soon as it released the 2020 report to prove that, the companies that wanted their names protected were rushing to the relevant agencies to pay up.

He said, “ The list of debtors reduced from 77 to 51 companies after the release, and the amount came down to 3.6 billion dollars.

“Which shows that from the point we released that information a lot of money came in. None of them disputed our report, rather they were giving excuses why they did not pay.

“The money includes all taxes and VAT being collected by the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) and all royalties being collected by the Nigeria Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC).

He, therefore, urged Nigerians to recognise the efforts of NEITI in debt recovery.