Participation In Petroleum Development Towards Sustainable Community Development In The Niger Delta

Continued from last Monday June 7, 2010.

The book “Participation in Petroleum Development, Towards Sustainable Community Development in the Niger Delta” by Eseme-Alabo Dr. Edward Bristol-Alagbariya is essential for key oil industry experts, administrators, scholars and students who want to gain further insight on how the Niger Delta can benefit from oil exploration and exploitation. The Tide, beginning from this edition, run excerpts of the book. Enjoy it.

10.2 Improved Community Involvement Enhanced by Greater Citizens’ Empowerment in Decision Making and the Stakeholder Perspective

The questions designed to address the crises in the Delta region are aimed at identifying the existing forms or measures of CI in petroleum development in the communities of the region. The author examines whether or not these forms or measures of CI are capable of fulfilling the globally-recognised need and widely accepted principles of PP in environmental decision-making, so as to suggest necessary improvements. Focused on the stakeholder theory in business relations, the author identifies three major stakeholders of the petroleum development business in Nigeria. As indicated in Chapter 1, these stakeholders are the oil-producing communities and the JV partners of the business (ie, the MNOCs and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), representing the FG for and on behalf of the FRN).

Studies are continually revealing that the results of development proposals are better when the affected, concerned and interested members of the public are empowered to participate in the decision-making process of such proposals. There is thus no alternative to interactive CI in petroleum development in Nigeria, the lack of which is the root cause of the marginalisation and poverty in the Delta region and hence the crises in the region. Similarly, there is no alternative path to Nigeria’s prosperity than greater citizens’ empowerment in the country’s decision-making processes. As the oil-producing communities are stakeholders (of the petroleum development business in Nigeria), whose interactive involvement cannot be ignored or undermined in the decision-making process of the business, so are the entire citizens of Nigeria stakeholders whose interactive involvement in the governance of the country cannot be ignored or undermined.

10.3 Identified Forms and/or Measures of Community Involvement in Petroleum         Development in the Delta Region and other Related Issues

The author identifies two main forms or measures of CI in petroleum resources development in the Delta region. Including other instances of CI, these are designed to enable citizens of the resources-producing communities to make input into the ancillary decision-making processes of the resources development projects sited in the communities. The main measures of CI are those statutorily designed by the FG, and the CSR or industry-driven measures designed by the MNOCs operating in the region. For example, the EIA process identified in Chapter 5 and the public objection hearing system identified in Chapter 6 are statutory forms of CI designed by the FG. Another form or measure of CI designed by the FG is the Nigerian (Local) Content Policy (NCP), which involves the generality of Nigerians. The NCP evolved from the FG’s economic self-reliance policy based on equity participation of Nigerians and Nigerian businesses in all spheres of Nigeria’s economy, especially in the petroleum and other sectors of the economy dominated by foreigners, was designed to enhance the industrial development and advancement of the country as a sovereign entity. Other forms and measures of CI identified are those increasingly being designed by the MNOCs to fulfil their social responsibility (CSR) initiatives following those of their parent companies and groups, such as their sectoral groups. Most of these initiatives are designed outside and introduced into Nigeria by individual companies (such as Shell Nigeria) or by individual corporate groups (such as the Shell companies in Nigeria, of which NLNG is a part). CSR measures, increasingly designed by the MNOCs to address the crises in the Delta region, include Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) entered into with host communities. Other CSR measures mentioned in passing in Chapter 6 include the involvement of professional CBOs in the EIA process of development projects in the communities, and the employment of the services of land-owning families and communities to provide surveillance services to protect the MNOCs’ oil and gas installations. These three measures are discussed in Chapter 9. Other measures discussed in Chapter 6 include the National Content Plans of the MNOCs, as exemplified by the NLNG Local Content Plan designed from the Shell (ie, Shell Nigeria) Nigerian Content Policy (NCP). The Shell Project-Advisory Committee (PAC) system is discussed in Chapter 6 as a voluntary CI measure. Other voluntary CSR measures identified in Chapter 7 include the engagement of local NGOs and other community-based organisations such as community development committees (CDCs) to execute the Community Developments (CDs) and other community relations (CR) initiatives of the MNOCs in the oil-producing communities. The main CSR CI measures discussed in Chapter 7 are the Shell Nigeria stakeholders’ workshops, the NLNG stakeholders’ workshops, and the Niger Delta Environmental Survey (NDES) initiated by Shell Nigeria and almost entirely funded by the MNOCs under the umbrella of the Oil Producers’ Trade Section (OPTS) of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Also, the FG is involved in the NDES. This makes the NDES a hybrid form of CI in petroleum development.  

The identified CSR forms of CI may directly or indirectly fulfil the government’s policy initiatives, such as its poverty alleviation, economic empowerment and SD initiatives. For instance, the NCP is designed by MNOCs such as Shell Nigeria and NLNG in a way to implement the objective of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process by providing impact-benefits for the communities directly affected by petroleum development projects. By so doing, the Shell Local (ie, Nigerian) Content Policy and the NLNG Local Content Plan are able to promote the poverty alleviation and economic empowerment programmes of the FG in the Delta region and other oil-producing areas of the country. In spite of the shortcomings of the project level EIA process being practised, this process stands remarkable as the most vibrant form of CI in petroleum resources development in Nigeria. Therefore, as expressed in Chapter 5, there is need to further develop the EIA, EA, or IA process of the resources development projects at strategic levels of the resources development proposals (ie, at the levels of policies, plans and projects), to enhance SD of the resources and sound and equitable SCD in the oil-producing areas.

Broadly speaking, as compared to project level EIA process, strategic environmental assessment (SEA) has a better prospect of enhancing SD of Nigeria’s major natural resources and overall SD in the country. Given that IA is a source of CD and socio-economic empowerment of citizens of the oil-producing communities, Chapters 8 and 9 demonstrate how CI in the IA process of oil and gas development projects in the Delta region enable communities to bargain for or to derive social investments from the MNOCs. The author demonstrates that these investments are being provided by the MNOCs mainly because of the lack of GSR measures in the form of provision of basic infrastructures and other public utilities in the communities. These investments help to foster CD and to socio-economically empower citizens of the communities, so as to alleviate poverty in, and government’s neglect of, the Delta region. By placing more emphasis on the provision of social investments, the MNOCs appear to be ignoring or compromising the degree of environmental protection required of them. The MNOCs therefore need to improve upon their environmental performance measures towards SD of petroleum resources, as well as their social performances beyond public relations, so as to contribute more meaningfully to environmentally-sound and socially-equitable SCD in the oil-producing areas.

To be continued