PIB: Protect Host Communities, and the Environment - Ogoni Chiefs

It is no news that oil producing communities bear the brunt of oil exploration and production. Decades of unregulated oil operations have left communities devastated and in many cases, totally stripped of their sources of livelihood, coupled with the destruction of their environment.  Among several pioneering provisions, the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) introduced initiatives aimed at increasing the participation of oil producing communities in the oil and gas sector, as well as promoting environmental sustainability in the areas where oil exploration and production take place. It recognizes that oil operations (including seismic operations, mining, oil spill resulting from equipment failure, human error, corrosion etc) can cause damage to private property rights such as lands, buildings, economic trees, crops, fishing rights and equipment, water sources and venerated objects. 

PHOTOSPEAK: PIB CONSULTATIVE MEETING IN PORT HARCOURT

Host Communities Should Co-Sign FG-Oil Company Joint Venture Agreements - Ledum Mittee

Host communities should become parties to joint venture agreements between the federal government and oil companies. This view was expressed by one of the participants at Spaces for Change (S4C) Consultative Meeting on the PIB held in Port Harcourt yesterday, Monday, February 25, 2013. The meeting aimed to generate critical reflection and input from a wide spectrum of citizens and professionals, the civil society, industry experts on provisions of the Petroleum Industry Bill relating to the environment and community participation in the oil and gas industry.

LEADERSHIP TRAINING: Relationship Intelligence & Workplace Productivity

“Increasingly, the best of breed lead not by virtue of power alone, but by excelling in the art of relationship.” – Daniel Goleman, PhD- Leadership Expert, Author

First introduced by Bernard G. Guerney in the 1960s, Relationship Enhancement (RE)  has for over forty years, proven to be an effective productivity booster  in the workplace and in the home. RE is a skills- based training model that focuses on empowering the individual to excel in their personal and professional relationships.

  

On March 27, 2013, Spaces for Change will be convene an RE training and coaching class targeted at young professionals and entrepreneurs, unemployed graduates, including young school leavers to bolster their employability skills, leadership capabilities and productivity in the workplace. Recognizing that today’s youth can be at the forefront of social change, this training is specifically designed to empower young people to learn new approaches to high performance, sustain corporate and personal relationships, build social capital and become catalysts for change.

Here Comes Another Slap-on-the-wrist Judgment!

By Victoria Ibezim-Ohaeri 

Last Wednesday, a self-acclaimed pension fund thief, Mr. Yakubu Yusuf was grandly ushered into the infamous Country Club of Corruption. This time around, a Nigerian court was the usher!  In a bizarre judgment totally bereft of shame, logic and good conscience, a man who pleaded guilty to stealing a whopping N23 Billion Naira ($203 million) was given a two year prison sentence, with an option to pay a N750,000 ( $1,500) fine in lieu of the sentence. So brazenly, Justice Talba Abubakar Mahmud of the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja spewed out a shiny incentive to loot, and loot, and loot according to one’s power and official might.  So cruelly disgorged into the nation’s judicial annals is a precedent legitimizing the rape of public treasury provided the lootee is willing to pay a tiny tithe offering – called “fine” – to evade punishment!  

Show Them the Ropes

By Yemi Onafuye

Succession is important to me now as a young person, not because I am overly anxious to take over power but rather because I increasingly grow concerned over what tomorrow hold for this great nation, Nigeria. Who are the leaders of tomorrow? This is something to worry about considering the fact that leadership has been the undoing of Nigeria thus far. If we would not remain undone, our leaders have to be different. 

I once came across two schools of thought. The first opined that leaders are born not made; the second stated that leaders are made not born. I agreed with the latter since the characteristics that make a person a good leader are learnt over time. Even if some of them are innate potentials, they have to be developed before they can be of use to anybody. This means it is a delusion to simply point at the youths once the question “who are the leaders of tomorrow?” is asked, without taking into consideration the fact that tomorrow’s leaders have to go through a making process, the result of which would determine what sought of leaders they become.   

Ezekwesili Got it Wrong! - Labaran Maku

Labaran Maku, Nigeria’s Information Minister, writes a rejoinder to a convocation address delivered by Oby  Ezekwesili at the 42nd convocation of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria.

The recent statements by Mrs. Obiageli Ezekwesili at UNN’s convocation ceremony on January 24, 2013, betray a surprisingly limited understanding of government finances. These statements are even more curious in light of the fact that she has held senior positions in government, and more recently, a position as a Vice President of the World Bank. However, rather than speculate about her motives, we would focus on the facts.

OBIAGELI EZEKWESILI'S UNN CONVOCATION LECTURE

Protocols

I am hugely delighted to return to my alma mater the great and only University of Nigeria to speak at your 42nd convocation. Twenty eight years ago I sat just like you those of you who are part of the graduating Class of 2013; excited by my graduation. It was 1985 and I was very privileged to be one of the then only 3% of our own youthful population that had the opportunity of a university education. Today, you are still fortunate to be one of the yet paltry 4.3% of your own youthful generation with an opportunity for university education. For Nigeria that percentage does not compare favorably with 37.5% for Chile 33.7% for Singapore 28.2% for Malaysia, 16.5% for Brazil and 14.6%.  Our lag in tertiary education enrollment is quite revealing and could be interpreted as the basis of the competitiveness gap between the same set of countries and Nigeria. The reason is that “…. tertiary enrollment rate which is the percentage of total enrollment, regardless of age, in post-secondary institutions to the population of people within five years of the age at which students normally graduate high school…….plays an essential role in society, creating new knowledge, transferring knowledge to students and fostering innovation”. The countries with the most highly educated citizens are also some of the wealthiest in the world in a study by the OECD published by the Wall Street Journal last year. The United States, Japan, Canada, South Korea, Finland, Norway, Israel, United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia also have among the largest Gross Domestic Products. All these countries aggressively invest in education.

What is a HOST COMMUNITY?

 

What is a host community? Who and who should benefit from the 10 per cent of all oil and gas earnings reserved for the oil producing areas through the Petroleum Host Community Fund (PHC) created by the new Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB)? What features should a community have to earn the title of a “host community”? In what way(s) would the Fund benefit the host communities?

These questions and many more dominated discussions at a consultative roundtable on the PIB organized by Spaces for Change, a Lagos-based public policy and advocacy organization. Participants comprised mainly of civil society leaders, oil and gas experts, legal practitioners, energy correspondents, former senior executives of international oil companies and representatives of oil producing communities. Diverse stakeholders' concerns about the PHC Fund provoked heated debates, strong arguments and counter-arguments for and against the establishment of the Fund.