A bill which seeks to reform Nigeria’s oil sector will strip its operations of secrecy and make them transparent, Nigerian oil minister Rilwanu Lukman said Thursday.
“The bill removes confidentiality on a scale not seen in the world before,” Lukman said at a meeting organised by state-run Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
“Nigeria will move in one step from one of the most opaque petroleum nations in Africa to one of the most open and transparent in the world,” Lukman said.
“The texts of all licences, leases and contracts and any of the changes to such document will no longer be confidential,” he said.
Analysts have often criticised the secrecy that shrouds the sector.
Speaking on behalf of the International Oil Companies (IOCs), the Managing Director of Chevron, Andrew Fawthrop, urged Nigerian authorities to make the provisions in the bill, now before the parliament, clear before it was passed.
“Some of the provisions in the bill are still open to interpretations,” Fawthrop said at the meeting being held ahead of a parliamentary public debate on the proposed law.
“This is not a surprise. This is a very large bill… but we need to make sure that the provisions in the bill are clear… It is very important that we clarify that before its codified,” Fawthrop said.