…As Reps move to stop him

From Dennis Mernyi and Kemi Yesufu, Abuja

MINISTER of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, Tuesday in Abuja approved the immediate unbundling of the present Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) into seven entities.

The seven entities, he said, are to be run as businesses with focus on efficiency and profit motives.

Kachikwu also announced the appointment of seven Chief Executive Officers for the first seven entities into which NNPC was split.

The new CEOs, according to the Minister, include Upstream – Bello Rabiu, Group General Manager, Corporate Planning and Services; Downstream Henry Ikem Obih, Group General Manager Treasury; the new CEO Refineries is Anibar Kragha.

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Others are the CEO in charge of Gas and Power, Saidu Mohammed, formerly Managing Director of Kaduna Petroleum and Petrochemical Company; CEO, Ventures, is Babatunde Adeniran, formerly GED Cand I, Isiaka Abdulrasaz, Group Executive Director, and Executive Head, Isa Inua, Corporate Services, formerly Deputy Managing Director, Commercial Services.

Under the new structure, the new NNPC is now made up of a lean group headquarters and four autonomous business units and one non-core assets.

The Upstream company will have Nigeria Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) and IDLS while the Downstream Company will have Retail, NPMC and NPSC. Gas and Power Company will have NGPTC, NGMC and the Gas and Power Investment and the Refineries will have Warri Refinery, Kaduna Refinery and Port Harcourt Refinery.

The Minister who spoke to newsmen in Abuja also stated that government has not removed subsidy on petroleum products as being speculated, noting, however  that price modulation currently being implemented does not have subsidy cost. “We have intelligently gone through the price and discovered that the cost has gone down,” he stated.

Meanwhile, the House of Representatives yesterday  described as unacceptable, the planned unbundling of the NNPC, as recently announced by the Minister of State for Petroleum and Group Managing Director of the corporation, Kachukwu, saying he did not follow the constitutional process.

They said in adherence to due process, President Muhammadu Buhari should send an executive bill to the National Assembly as soon as possible if he feels government was indeed interested in  unbundling NNPC.