FG to Establish NAMSTRA for Bid Rounds -DPR Boss
The Director of the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) Engr. Sarki Auwalu has said that the Federal government is coming out with the National Acreage Management Strategy (NAMSTRA) before the end of this year.
NAMSTRA is expected to put in place strategies to determine the nation’s periodic bid rounds.
This has become necessary according to the DPR boss given that the last bid round was about 17 years ago and for the nation’s oil industry to remain competitive within the Sub-sahara region there is now the need to determine Nigeria’s potential oil basins and know when to call for bid rounds.
Speaking in a webinar hosted by Nigeria Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE) on Wednesday, titled “Nigeria Marginal Field Bid Round: Implications, Challenges and Opportunities” Auwalu said with the nation’s available seven basins comprising the Benue (central), Sokoto (north-west border), Chad (north-east), Bida (central, along the Niger valley), Dahomey (south- west) and Anambra (south-east) Basins and the Niger delta (south coastal) including the deep water, the establishment of NAMSTRA will help to predict when the next bid round will be after assessing the commercial viability of these basins. “NAMSTRA will also help to determine how prolific such basins will be in a bid round process” Auwalu said.
On the interest of investors in the current bid round he pointed out that not less than ten companies have sought for each of the Marginal Field put out for bid this year. In all, he explained that about 600 companies are bidding for the 57 oil fields.
“First I will say that we have really witnessed an increase in bidders after the extension of the deadline to June 21. There has been almost 30 per cent increase in the participation.
“If you are making a bid or auctioning any oil field, you need to get 10 people per field really going after the field. We have 57 fields and we have over 600 companies. So. we can say that we are celebrating success so far.
“After the extension, we are moving according to schedule and now we are in the phase where we do pre-qualification for the bidders to apply. Everything is going perfectly” Auwalu said.
On the issue of Niger Delta people going to court if they are not given first line of refusal in the current bid round he explained that Nigeria has a constitution on how these things are done and will indulge the Niger Delta people to follow the due process in the bid round.
According to him Nigeria can not afford another crises given the existing crises brought about by the global pandemic. However, he pointed out that most of the States in the Niger Delta have applied for the bid round through their state-owned oil companies.
SOURCE: financialenergy.com
