Bukola Saraki, President of the Senate, has expressed worry over the continued delay by President Muhammadu Buhari to assent the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill into law.
The 10 year-old Petroleum Industry Governance Bill was passed by the National Assembly in March 2018, and transmitted to President Muhammadu Buhari for his assent.
The leadership of the National Assembly sent the harmonised PIGB to President Buhari on Tuesday, July 3 for his assent.
However, the President withheld assent to the harmonised Bill and communicated decline of the assent to the National Assembly on August 29, 2018.
Meantime, Buhari is doubling as the Minister of Petroleum Resources in the country.
Speaking at a dinner organised as part of activities at the ongoing 24th Nigerian Economic Summit in Abuja Monday, Saraki restated the resolve of the legislature to mount pressure for him to assent the bill.
According to him, this has become necessary given the importance of the bill to the development of the oil and gas sector in Nigeria.
The Senate president described as unfortunate that the bill had not been assented to, saying “we took it as a responsibility to drive that bill to a level it has never been in a decade.
“That bill, a lot of people when we started said we cannot do it, but we demonstrated we have the political will and the commitment to do it. We passed the governance bill and it went to the executive.
“What I expected considering the kind of work that was done was for us both arms to sit down because the issues that were raised are not issues that are not surmountable.”
“Unfortunately, after so many months, the bill has come back with a query, that can easily be trashed out in a day session.
Saraki noted “Those in the petroleum sector will agree with me that they have never seen the engagement we saw in the governance bill.
“Secondly, we had the fiscal bill and we have taken it to the point that has never been archived, but I believe a lot of the operators will want to ask what will happen to the fiscal bill if the governance bill was not assented to.“Our intention is to go back to the executive and sit down with them in the interest of Nigeria.
“This is a very good bill as most operators and the technical people in the sector commended it.’’
He said the observation made on the bill was not enough reasons to stop its assent because of the huge positive impact it would make on investments in the sector.
“Because as you know, there is no serious investment going in the oil and gas sector because people are not sure of what to expect,’’ the Senate President remarked.
“The Petroleum Industry Bill (#PIB) should have been an Executive Bill, unfortunately it wasn’t…”
President of the Senate, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, speaking about @NASSNigeria’s passage of the #PIGB at @NESGNigeria’s #NES24. pic.twitter.com/19MwX9CMYV
The Bill which was initiated by then President Umaru Yar’Adua and sent to the 6th National Assembly headed by Senator David Mark in 2008 has been enmeshed in controversy due to some of its provisions.
