MINISTER of Petroleum Resources and current President of the
Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Mrs. Diezani
Alison-Madueke’s name will be featuring prominently in public
discussions in the days ahead. Having presided over the nation’s
economic engine for a stretch of five years, the various publics, local
and international, may find it hard to resist the temptation to ex-ray
her controversy-dogged tenure.
Born December 6, 1960, the pretty holder of Bachelor’s Degree in
Architecture (Howard University, USA) and Master’s in Business
Administration, MBA (Cambridge University, UK) is not new to the
petrol-dollar spinning industry. She had worked briefly in the United
States before returning to Nigeria to join the Shell Petroleum
Development Corporation. She rose to become the first female Executive
Director, Nigeria, in 2006. Her sojourn in the public sector started a
year after when she was appointed Minister of Transport in 2007. She was
moved to the Ministry of Mines and Steele Development in 2008. She
mounted the saddle as Petroleum Minister in 2010, again, as the first
female to preside over that ministry in the country’s oily history.
In the five-year tenure as petroleum minister, she tried her hands on
a number of policy initiatives that she thought could improve the
industry and participants as well. According to her, most of these
initiatives were meant to “revolutionalise” the industry through reforms
with expected far-reaching implications. The Petroleum Industry Bill,
in which she is believed to have a great deal of input, is unfortunately
still gathering dust in the chambers of the federal legislature.
Incidentally, many are made to believe that the PIB, if passed, would
have been the talisman for a turnaround of the oil and gas sector.
In a recent media engagement, the minister had rued what she might
have considered the inexplicable delay on the part of federal lawmakers
in passing the bill. The envisioned Eldorado, presumably inherent in the
PIB, is the transformation of Nigeria’s oil and gas industry in such a
way that a greater majority of Nigerians can benefit from the abundance
of the resources and the wealth therefrom.
For starters, however,
Allison-Madueke was able to get President Goodluck Jonathan to sign the
Nigerian Content Act in April 2010. The Act, primarily, has placed
increased percentage of petroleum industry contracts in the hands of
indigenous Nigerian contractors. Apparently, this must have informed the
award of contracts in the industry by President Jonathan to some
ex-militant groups and individuals. If the Act is anything to go by, the
quantum of contracts available to foreign contractors has reduced
drastically.
One of the most controversial policies introduced under
Alison-Madueke is the government’s plan to remove state subsidies on
fuel prices. She has been a strong advocate of subsidy removal, a policy
which is being resisted by the mass of the Nigerian people. Her
argument is premised on the huge financial burden tossed on the
government through subsidy payments. It’s well known, however, that a
sizable chunk of such payments were going into a few private pockets.
It’s a regime of official sharp practices and under-the-counter
dealings. Owing to official collaboration and manipulation, the subsidy
regime has benefitted a few wealthy magnates, leaving the people at the
receiving end. Industry watchers are of the view that subsidy, the way
it is being implemented under Alison-Madueke’s watch, encourages
inefficiency, corruption and diversion of resources away from
investments in critical infrastructure.
Since her foray into political/public life, Diezani Alison-Madueke
has had her fair share of controversies and scandals. In June 2008, she
was subjected to a Senate probe after it emerged that as Transport
Minister, she had paid N30.9 billion about ($263 million) to
contractors, between December 26-31, 2007. However, she has never been
officially charged or tried for these allegations and has strongly
denied any wrongdoing. Diezani Allison-Madueke was alleged to have spent
billions of state dollars inappropriately on private jets in a country
where many go to bet hungry.
It was under her watch as Petroleum Resources Minister that the
proverbial can of worms was opened by the immediate past Governor of the
Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Sanusi Lamido, who raised the alarm that
$20 billion revenue that ought to come into the federation account was
missing. The minister’s response was that the alleged missing oil funds
from the accounts of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)
were connected to the reforms contained in the Petroleum Industry Bill
(PIB).
At the height of her reign as Petroleum Minister, she is said to be
holding sensitive and strategic official meetings in her house rather
than the office. This apparently is aimed at commanding some air of
invincibility and untouchability in the administration.
In September 2008, there was an unsuccessful attempt to kidnap
Alison-Madueke at her house in Abuja with her son, Chimezie Madueke. In
October 2009, the Nigerian Senate indicted the minister and recommended
her prosecution for an alleged transfer of N1.2 billion into the private
account of a toll company without due process and in breach of
concession agreement. However, the allegations have never been taken to
law, and the minister maintains her innocence.
In spite of all these allegations, Diezani Alison-Madueke has
consistently denied any wrong doing much less admitting to committing
any crime. Recently (after the elections), she denied reports that six
countries where she allegedly sought asylum turned down her request. She
however, vehemently denied the allegation.
Critics have also attributed her latter-day closeness and visits to a
former military Head of State, Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar, to seeking
some ‘soft landing’ ahead of her disengagement from the plum job. But
she denied it all. While addressing journalists in Abuja on Wednesday,
April 22, 2015, the minister retorted: “I have not sought such
assistance because I am not aware that I have been indicted of any crime
that I will need a soft landing”.
Commenting on the various allegations of financial recklessness and
impropriety levelled against her and her office, Alison-Madueke
lamented: “Over the last four years, I have been severally and
unfortunately accused and labelled in so many malicious and vindictive
ways. I have explained these things and pushed back robustly on these
accusations and I have even gone to court on many of them. Yet, they
keep being regurgitated.”
Alison-Madueke said it was “unfortunate, particularly when we are
moving into a transition period and looking forward to an incoming
government, which is coming to take over where we have ended. For
everything that has a beginning, there is an end and that is not a
surprise. What is the surprise is the sort of malevolence bordering on
personal malicious libel to my person during this period of time.”
Not one to shy away from a fight, Alison-Madueke did not express any
regrets over her actions as Petroleum Resources Minister, stressing:
“Quite frankly, I think as unprecedented as it is, it does not please
everybody and that cannot be helped. But let us remember the
unprecedented reforms that have happened in the oil industry during our
time, such as major gas reforms, the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB),
which has been completely revised, reformed and put into the hands of
members of the National Assembly where it has languished for two years.”
Concerning the private jet scandal, she responded that “we did all
these and we put them in place to reduce corruption, so for me to be
tagged with various tags of corruption, $10 million jet purchases, who
buys jet for $10 million dollars for goodness sake?”
With regards to her performance as Petroleum Minister, believed she
had done the best for Nigeria in this job and that she had attained many
firsts in the history of oil and gas, “especially in the reforms that
we have done”. “In this period of time, I have stepped on many big toes,
particularly the toes of the cabals that were in the industry when we
came in,” she said.
As the Jonathan administration gradually winds down, the world will
soon get to know how Mrs. Alison-Madueke ran the nation’s oil industry.
She may end up getting all the kudos or the knocks.
No comments:
Post a Comment