Buhari ready to invest in oil and gas

On Monday, President Muhammadu Buhari said Nigeria is open to investments and ready to provide leadership for Africa in oil and gas.

Nigeria launched its first ever Nigeria International Petroleum Summit  (NIPS).

The president while declaring the five days conference open said as an excerpt that;

“NIPS is designed after the OTC in Houston to deepen, enrich and provide leadership for Africa and make it one of the most important annual oil and gas events globally.

“It is aimed at engendering potentially-economic benefits, generate employment and expand businesses in Nigeria and Africa.

“This summit will afford Nigeria a unique opportunity to showcase to the international community policy direction and efforts of government in the petroleum sector.

“This is especially in the new oil and gas exploration and markets, new measures to sanitise the sector, the expansion of investment opportunities to boost investors’ confidence, technological advancement and Nigeria’s content development.

“Nigeria is open to private investment in the downstream sector and pursuing vigorously a programme for the rehabilitation of existing refineries so as to enhance capacity to supply locally-refined petroleum products in Nigeria and West Africa.”

“We will continue to strive to achieve our target of seven per cent GDP growth rate within the next three years and be rest assured that previous efforts will be sustained.

“Our effort in stakeholder engagement and stabilising the Niger Delta will continue to receive due attention to ensure sustainable level of production, Buhari added. On ease of doing business, the President said he would continue to ensure that efforts in the petroleum sector and issues related to transparency, efficiency, enabling business environment and deploying new policies and regulations were enforced “so that investors will always feel at ease.

“Corruption in this industry must not be allowed in any form. On our part, we will not stop the fight until a new image is created where transparency will be the watchword in all our transactions.

“Our emphasis on gas investment is for cleaner economy that is gas-based in alignment with the Paris climate change agreement.

“The agenda for this summit portrays opportunities for all, hence we should do more than just talk about it, we should also act on the resolutions from here.”