The Chairman of Ghana National Petroleum Corporation, Prof. Wunmi Iledare, has said that the passage of the much-awaited Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) would increase Nigeria’s energy consumption appetite, warning that Nigeria must transit from energy production to that of consumption in order to maximise the country’s oil and gas potential for development that will impact on the people.
Ilebare pointed out that though efforts at replacing oil with alternative energy sources have been growing, Nigeria still has the chance to stir economic growth in the few decades before the replacement of fossil fuel as main source of global energy.
Speaking at a stakeholders’ engagement on PIB, held at the Ibom Hotel and Golf Resort, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, the professor of Petroleum Economics charged the National Assembly to fashion PIB capable of transforming Nigeria to an energy consumer by encouraging the maximisation of the value chain.
“Nigeria must move away from the thinking that emphasises energy production and move towards the economically impactful paradigm of energy consumption. It is energy consumption that will ensure the country grows its economy through value chain maximisation,” he stated.
Citing the example of Dubai, United Arab Emirates, which he said was a mere desert in the early 1980s, he said the country has wasted years through emphasis on oil rent and revenue sharing, stressing that the PIB must be deliberate in its national development purpose.
