Use Gas Flare Penalty To Fund Modular Refineries, HOSCON Tells FG

The Host Communities of Nigeria Producing Oil and Gas (HOSCON) has called on the Federal Government to deploy monies recovered from gas flare penalties to fund the construction of modular refineries in the Niger Delta.
HOSCON said that with such refineries, it would be unfashionable for the youths of the region to engage in illegal refining of crude oil that has caused environmental pollution, soot and destruction of aquatic lives and the biodiversity.
The National Chairman of HOSCON, Chief Jasper Jumbo, made the appeal during the 2022 Validation Annual Conference held with government and security officials in Port Harcourt.
Jumbo said that the conference with the theme, “Reviving Nigerian’s HOSCON Oil and Gas Communities for Inclusiveness and Sustainable Development”, was aimed at strategically repositioning and advancing the inclusive stakeholders of oil and gas community units to enhance the growth of the communities.
He stated that the conference’s resolutions demand the unmitigated release of the accumulated and earlier approved gas flare penalty fund and part thereof to be applied by the Federal Government in funding some of the proposed artisanal modular refineries.
“We fully support Federal Government’s initiative to set up three pilot modular refineries in each Niger Delta state that would hopefully correct the fragile and flawed past.
“We also thank the federal and state governments as well as the House of Representatives for the strong message sent, indicating signal of government’s intent to halt the debilitating effects and anxious emission from illegal oil bunkering, through host community involvement, application of indigenous technologies and subsidised funding.
“We plead with the Federal Government, through the National Assembly, to put a clause in the 3per cent Petroleum Industry Act to 5per cent in the near future in spite of the rising production costs, and allow the host communities to choose their management for the fund,”he said.
“We want the Federal Government, through the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) led by Sen. Godwin Akpabio and Barrister Effiong Akwa to call for and settle the long outstanding bills of genuine and performing NDDC contractors for executed projects, especially the founding fathers of the defunct OMPADEC, NDDC and traditional rulers of host oil and gas producing communities.
In his speech, the Commandant General of Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC), Gen. Ahmed Abubakar, represented by an Assistant Commandant General of the Corps, Dr Evelyn Ebitume, said that the agency would continue to carry out its mandate on the protection of oil and gas pipelines in the country.
He stated that activities of vandals led to economic wastage, and urged the youths and the public from host communities who live near the pipelines to avail the agency information that would help in curbing the activities of oil and gas pipeline vandals and bring the offenders to book.
Similarly, the Anambra State Commissioner for Lands, Bonaventure Enemali, has urged every community leader in the HOSCON catchment area to ensure that the voice of their community was heard.
Enemali urged chiefs in host communities not to neglect the interest of their people while negotiating with oil companies.
The states that endorsed the conference resolutions were Abia, Anambra, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, Imo, Ondo and Rivers.

By: Nelson Chukwudi