The Irish gas firm involved in the $9.6 billion asset controversy with Nigeria at the weekend blamed President Muhammadu Buhari’s government for the nation’s precarious situation in the matter.
According to P&ID, the current administration failed to take a conciliatory stance and was negligent in the processes leading to the confirmation of the award by the English Court.
A court in the United Kingdom had, two weeks ago, affirmed the right of P&ID to seize at least $9.6 billion (about N2.9 trillion in the official exchange rate of N305/$) of Nigeria’s assets as arbitration award because the country failed to live up to the terms of the contract.
The company’s latest position coincided with calls from authoritative voices in legal and diplomatic space on the government to cut its losses by seeking a more diplomatic means of resolving the impasse.
Key government officials, including Information and Justice ministers, Alhaji Lai Mohammed and Abubakar Malami, last week, alluded to fraud in the crafting of the 2010 gas contract that would have allowed P&ID build a state-of-the-art gas processing plant to refine natural gas (wet gas) into ‘lean gas.’
The company would receive no payment for executing the contract but own the by-products created by the refining, including propane, ethane, and butane — natural gas liquids (NGLs). The market would be worth billions of dollars over the 20-year lifespan of the contract.
The government has already instituted a probe of the contract.
Professor of Political Science, Bolaji Akinyemi, in a telephone interview with The Guardian, said there was nothing wrong in probing the processes leading to the contract but cautioned that the domestic component of the matter should be tackled separately while engaging the P&ID in resolving the matter.
“Deal with your domestic culprits separately. That can take you as long as you want. (But) try to reach a settled agreement with the foreign aggrieved company. Don’t wait for one to deal with the other. Let the nation learn the right lesson from this whole mess,” Akinyemi advised.
Source: Guardian Newspaper.
