Nigeria: Senate Confirms Diezani, Bala, Ruqayyatu

Abdul-Rahman Abubakar

30 June 2011

Seven persons nominated by President Goodluck Jonathan for ministerial appointment were yesterday confirmed by the Senate after undergoing a public screening process.

They include former Petroleum minister Mrs. Diezani Allison-Madueke (Bayelsa), former FCT minister Senator Bala Mohammed (Bauchi), former Labour minister Barrister Emeka Wogu (Abia), former Niger Delta minister Elder Godsday Orubebe (Delta), former Interior minister Navy Capt. Caleb Olubolade (Ekiti), former Education minister Professor Ruqayyatu Rufai (Jigawa) and former Health minister Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu (Ebonyi). All seven of them had served in the federal cabinet that was dissolved at the end of last month.

Speaking during her own confirmation hearings, Mrs. Allison-Madueke said the country is assured of striking crude oil at the Lake Chad Basin within the next two years. a team of geo-physicists led by a renowned Nigerian geo-physicist “has assured us that we will strike oil at the Lake Chad basin in about 24 months.”

She said oil exploration will also go ahead in seven other inland fields with five of the locations in the northern part of the country. Madueke said government has received assurances of the presence of hydro-carbons in the Benue Trough, the Bida basin down to the Anambra basin.

She also said the supply and availability of kerosene in the country is still facing various challenging that government is yet to find solutions to.

According to her, the availability of kerosene in the country is shrouded by sharp practice by marketers who are making it difficult for government to make the product available to consumers.

She said “even though we were able to make kerosene available in large quantity, we had a problem with price because our kerosene is of the same quality with aviation fuel and some unscrupulous marketers will buy the kerosene at cheaper price and sell it at higher price as aviation fuel.

“There is the problem of hoarding of kerosene. There is need for stronger regulation. I was advised to import the kerosene that has different propensity from the aviation fuel but because of the cases of explosions we had in the past, the one with low propensity can explode when fire is ignited at close range.”

She said in order to tackle the issue of importation of petroleum products, government has commenced major turnaround maintenance of the three refineries in the country.

“We realised that the maintenance in the past was done by companies that have no capacity to do the job. We have brought the actual companies that the constructed our refineries in the first place. JJC of Japan is going to do an aggressive turnaround of the traditional refineries.

“They have given us assurance that in the next three years, with the turnaround maintenance and the three Greenfield refineries that are coming on board, Nigeria will not only have enough products but will be a net exporter of the products. “

On the issue of removal of subsidy on petroleum products, Madueke said though government is desirous of removing the subsidy, it will not rush the process as it requires a lot of consultations and consideration.

She said government’s decision to remove the subsidy was because “the subsidy is not getting to the masses it is created to take care of; it is the retailers that are benefitting from it.”

Also speaking during the hearings, former Health Minister Onyebuchi Chukwu said the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) is to cover 30 percent of the people by 2015 from the present 2 percent coverage.

On his part, Barrister Wogu tasked the Senate on the need for a new revenue formula in the country, saying “Nigeria needs new revenue formula and it behoves on this assembly to provide it in accordance with Section 315 of the 1999 Constitution.”

The Senate will today continue with the confirmation hearing to screen the remaining ministerial nominees. Thirty four names were sent to the Senate by President Jonathan on Monday evening, but another 8 names are still expected to be sent. Four states, Kaduna, Plateau, Cross River and Ondo so far did not have a ministerial nominee in the list submitted by the president. The 1999 Constitution requires each state to have at least one minister, and since 1999, the president usually appoints one more minister per geopolitical zone, for a total of 42. Ogun and Benue states already have 2 nominees each among the 34.

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