From John Ofikhenua, Abuja
In the bid to ascertain that the contractors executing the host communities contracts in the Train 7 project of the Nigerian Liquified Natural Gas (NLNG) are engaging the real members the host communities as stated by the Nigeria Content Development Monitoring Board (NCDMB), the board has commenced the verification of the would-be contractors.
Its General Manager, Corporate Communications/Zonal Coordination, Dr. Ginah O. Ginah, who spoke at a capacity building workshop for media stakeholders in Abuja, recalled that there was a time that the board discovered that the oil and cas companies were patronising their acquaintances claiming that they were giving contracts to members of the host communities.
Citing an instance of the Bonny LNG, he said 80 per cent of the people that were patronised with contracts as host communities members were not genuine host community people.
The rule of the board is that at least one of the directors of the company implementing the contract must be a member of the host community, he said.
With this, the board gives the host communities a sense of belonging and benefits from the project to serve as measure for containing Niger Delta restiveness.
He said: “We have a situation where in the past, the oil and gas companies will tell you they are patronising oil host communities when you really go into it, you will find out that they are patronising people they know and not people from those communities.
“So, we have seen that happen. I have been to one verification exercise in LNG Bonny and 80 per cent of the people they were using as host community people were not actually host community people. This adds to the tension in the communities because they feel that they are being shut out.
“To be a host community’s company, at least, one of the directors must be a community people. So the verification, among other things, is to ascertain that one of the director is from that community. There are still what it means for this purpose to do host community verification.”
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He allayed fear over complete depletion of the $200million intervention fund, stressing that the arrangement with the Bank of Industry (BoI) was to grow the fund to $1billion.
According to him, 70 per cent of the initial $200million fund has been given out as loan to players in the oil and gas industry while the board looks forward to receiving repayment from the beneficiaries, plans are also underway to increase the fund to $1billion.
He said currently, the board has $200million agreement with the BoI spread across five products of asset financing, manufacturing, contract financing, refinancing, and community contractor financing.
“Asset financing, contract financing, manufacture financing, single obligor limit is $10million. For community contractor financing is N20million. Our arrangement with the BOI is to grow that fund from $200million to $1billion. It means that as we have currently achieved 70per cent drawdown, let us not be scared that they has finished,” he said.
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