Celebrating the GMD, NNPC, Mallam Mele Kyari at 56
Despite the negative impact of Coronavirus pandemic, which has culminated in low oil prices and dwindling fortunes of stakeholders in Nigeria, and globally, the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, is doing well by every standard because of good leadership.
Specifically, Mallam Mele Kyari, the 19th and current Group Managing Director of NNPC, has transformed NNPC from a Corporation that used to be synonymous with opacity into a paragon of transparency through the publication of the Corporation’s Monthly Financial and Operations Report (MFOR) to keep Nigerians, whom he always refers to as the shareholders of the company, abreast of its operations and financials.
He also took the transparency to the next level by publishing the Corporation’s 2018 Audited Financial Statement in July last year, apparently the first in the 43-year history of the Corporation that its Audited Financial Statement was made available to the public. He followed that up with the publication of the 2019 Audited Financial Statement in October. One significant feature of the 2019 AFS was the 97.8% reduction in losses which was largely attributable to the transparency drive.
Furthermore, Mallam Kyari also launched the Open Data portal on the NNPC website where such information as staff strength and asset base are published. He topped that up with having the Corporation listed as an Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (EITI) Partner Company, joining a group of over 65 extractive companies, state-owned enterprises, commodity traders, financial institutions, and industry partners who commit to observing the EITI principles by promoting transparency in all facets of their operations and transactions.
More importantly, he invested much in the areas of exploration and production of crude oil and gas, targeted at increasing reserves and production capacity of Nigeria in the Committee of oil nations. The GMD also led NNPC to get a number of alternative funding facilities for the NPDC and the Corporation’s Joint Ventures to facilitate further development of some assets. These include, the N875.75m NPDC OML 65 Alternative Funding and Technical services package with CMES-OMS Petroleum Development Company, the $3.15bn Alternative Financing Package with Sterling Exploration and Energy Production Company Limited (SEEPCO) and other partners for the development of NPDC’s OML 13.
Apart from successfully leading the charge to take the Final Investment Decision (FID) on the NLNG Train 7, he has revved up the process of completing long-standing gas infrastructure projects such as the Escravos-Lagos Pipeline System Phase 2 and Obiafu-Obrikom-Oben (OB3) gas pipeline. In the face of the Covid-19 pandemic, he helped to midwife the flag off of construction work on the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) Gas Pipeline on June 29, 2019.
From all indications, Mallam Kyari ended the year 2020 well with the inauguration of the Oredo Integrated Gas Handling Facility in Ologbo, Edo State, and will continue to do well in the coming years, because of the cooperation of staff and structures as well as systems already put in place.
