In a preliminary settlement agreement, the NNPC has agreed to address the production-sharing contract of Oil Mining Lease 130 dispute. Last Thursday, the group signed a Head of Terms (HoT) with two partners, Chinese Cnooc and Nigeria’s Sapetro.
This resolution had been expected over a year ago as Mele Kyari NNPC the group managing director had earlier noted. The Chinese and Nigerian companies had sought to address the crude export dispute with the NNPC.
Total SA, Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Eni SpA, Chevron Corp are other major oil companies that are in oil mining lease dispute with Nigeria’s NNPC. A few years ago Nigeria alleged an under-declaration issue of over 57 million barrels of oil exports by these companies. The charges were denied by the companies.
NNPC who is seeking a payment of about $12.7 billion for the exports is leaving the dispute cases open in a federal high court. However, they also say the Thursday agreement signifies “a major milestone towards the resolution of all disputes related to Oil Mining Lease (OML) 130 Production Sharing Contract, Akpo & Egina included”.
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