Speaking on the back of the 2020/2021 marginal fields bid licensing round, stakeholders in Abuja noted that corruption, arbitrary decisions, undue political influence and other issues were still prevalent in the country’s bidding process.
“The other gaps included “high fees and levies charged which warranted a drop in the number of shortlisted applications and/or mergers/SPVs formed by companies; allegations of undue access to insider information by some privileged persons that complemented already available Competent Person Reporting and Net Person Value reports to reach decisions about whether to top-up a nearly sealed bid to swing awards or simply walk away; hush-talks’ about official and unofficial payments by bidders, all...
They sought need to halt political interference, even as the experts questioned the capacity of NUPRC to mediate and reconcile such disputes and conflicts of equity negotiation, governance structure, funding and profit-sharing formula as demonstrated in the conflagration occasioned by the SPVs created out of co-joined fields.
They equally saw the move as an opportunity for many downstream petroleum companies to make a significant inroad into the upstream petroleum development sector. “More specifically, the process should disclose information, including names of companies that expressed interest for which blocks/fields, names of their owners, amount of money paid, processes scaled through or fell behind, plans for host community development and contract transparency should be prioritized in the process.