The Oil Producers Trade Section
(OPTS) has volunteered to work with the Nigerian Extractive Industries
Transparency Initiative (NEITI’s) in its drive to deepen the pursuit for
transparency and accountability in the oil and gas and mining value chain of
the nation’s economy.
The OPTS Executive Director,
Gwueke Ajaifia made this pledge at the NEITI-Companies Forum Meeting with the
theme: Deepening and Strengthening Engagement in Nigeria’s Extractive Sector,
in Lagos.
Ajaifia also expressed the readiness of OPTS in meeting the
required financial contributions to bringing the industry together to achieve
its goal.
Ajaifia said going forward, OPTS
will be more efficient, more committed for others to follow suit.
He said : “ For us in the OPTS,
we are very interested in NEITI, we are on the board of NEITI, but beyond that
it is in our own interest to be able to show people what we are doing because
transparency will help prevent corruption and mismanagement.
According to Ajaifia ‘if I know
clearly that my activities will be seen by the public then I will be careful in
what I do in the industry’.
The executive director who noted
that corruption thrives very well in areas where there is no transparency ,
observed that the industry is very
important in that regard because , so
much money is earned for the country ,
for which people deserve to know what
they are spent on.
“We are actually creating wealth
for the country, but this wealth people must see how it comes in, how it’s used
to decide whether it’s judiciously applied”, he added.
He said although the OPTS
interfere with NEITI at all levels, sometimes giving data when they request for
it but never understood what was on the on the other side. He said any society
that does not have data information cannot grow, data and information are very
key he added.
“With data you can plan, you can
understand the trend of things, so in our society people just do things without
planning; NEITI will help us develop our mindset. Beyond having data, having
the right data is also very important because if you use the wrong data you end
up in one direction”, he stated.
He said those in the industry should be interested in
what happens in it, adding that the oil and gas industry is the biggest
provider of foreign exchange for the country and so if people have a wrong
perception of what they see outside then it will not help the industry.
That’s why we should be
interested in being very active in this kind of forum so that we will help
NEITI to get the right data. He said that as key stakeholders of those in the
oil company OPTS will ensure that the next forum will be well attended, I just
want to repeat that NEITI important for everyone, he reiterated.
“So for our own part we have a
role to play, myself and colleague we have been talking about it, we need to
reach out to members of the industry forum to reestablish their commitment and
make sure that the next forum will be one that will have everybody so that at
the end of the day it will be a win, win situation,” the executive director
stated.
The Executive Secretary of NEITI,
Orji Ogbonnaya-Orji, said the objective of the forum was to at least emphasize
the importance of this forum. He said that the forum was put together to create
opportunities for companies to examine the work NEITI is doing, ask questions
where they needed to and seek clarification without writing letters.
Again, it’s for them to also
understand what their jobs are adding that participation in NEITI has
implications on the corporate reputation of the company globally and also has
implication on investment decisions.
He said NEITI is that review
mechanism on how to attract transparency, accountability and good governance.
What we are set up to do is to encourage, create enabling environment for
companies and we as member of 67members countries, whatever happens here is
transferred to 67member countries around including the G7 countries.
The executive secretary said the agency will also want to engage in series
of trainings with the OPTS to be able to know truly who NEITI is and also
understand what the agency is not doing right, that it could do better and then
seek their views on how to improve. “The forum will have to be creative, it’s
already creative, strengthened and put in place for that to happen”, he stated.
“We thought today would have been
a day to expose you to the recent reports we released and then we also thought
we could use the opportunity to discuss some of the opportunities and
challenges and how to strengthen the OPTS participation, mining participation
and the participation of all the companies in the process but that will have to
wait until when we have the right forum, we will work with the OPTS to bring
the forum back," Orji stated.
Leave Comments