Yemisi Izuora
Independent oil producer,Aiteo has reiterated its resolve to retrieve missing 16 million barrels of oil allegedly diverted by oil major Shell.
Aiteo reinforced this position after it observed what it referred as a calculated media attack on its reputation and the company’s Executive Vice Chairman, Benedict Peters.
In a statement by Indiana Mathew group head media operations of Aiteo, “Any objective observer will easily appreciate the motivation on the part of the international oil giant to propagate this campaign of calumny.
By doing so, the outcome will create unnecessary digressions and distractions from the current issues encapsulated by our demand that Shell accounts and pays for over 16 million barrels of oil belonging to us and the Nigerian government, missing through their actions and activities.
Hitherto unchallenged evidence of this missing crude is exemplified by the discrepancies in the production figures independently reported by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR). As is standard in the industry, DPR reports actual reconciled production volumes from the wells that flow to the terminal.”.
Mathew, states that their records and statistics align with Aiteo’s reconciled production figures and that thenNNPC, on the other hand, reports crude measured at the tanks in the terminal exclusively managed, operated and controlled by the IOC.
According to him, It is the analysis of these independent reports that demonstrates the glaring discrepancies, adding, “Indeed, over the relevant three-year period, the figures from both government agencies set out below make grim, desperate reading:
2016 barrels: NNPC 16 million v DPR 22 million, 2017 barrels: NNPC 13.5 million v DPR 21 million and 2018 barrels: NNPC 15 million v DPR 25 million.
He said that critically, it was a clear indication that buttresses the fact that millions of barrels remained unaccounted for is the oil giant’s deployment of unapproved metering equipment at its terminal.
He revealed that, “Complaints by Local Oil Companies (LOCs), including Aiteo, led to an investigation by DPR culminating in the regulatory agency releasing a report that identified irregularities in that respect and deprecated the methodology used by the IOC.
The DPR issued further directions affirming its non-approval of the equipment used by the IOC and in doing so, it imposed a sanction in the sum of N250,000 Naira on the oil giant for violation of Part 1, Section 2(d) of the Mineral Oil Safety Regulations and the provisions of section 51 of the Petroleum Act 1969.
However, despite this, the IOC has continued to use the unapproved metering equipment, continually understating the crude oil due to certain LOCs, including Aiteo.
Mathew added that while dispute resolution between Aiteo and the IOC continues, this ploy by the IOC to incentivise certain sections of the media to publish false and damning reports targeted at maligning the reputation of Aiteo and its Executive Vice Chairman, Benedict Peters, is being deployed as a means of muddying the waters and diverting the public’s attention from the pertinent current issues.
“The premises of this diversionary tactics have been ventilated and adequately addressed in the distant past, by clarification provided and, most significantly, judicial pronouncements by several courts in Nigeria that have effectively disposed of the allegations comprehensively.
It seems inescapably obvious that the purport of this new, inherently malicious, undisguisedly fallacious campaign is a surreptitious attempt to distract the public from the recent revelations about its atrocities against the Nigerian people and the many reparations it will be inevitably made to pay.” he added.
Nevertheless, he said Aiteo has continued, unperturbed, to undertake and accomplish its identified objectives in its resolve to remain one of the foremost indigenous oil and gas companies in Nigeria, pointing that as an indigenous company providing jobs for thousands of Nigerians directly and tens of thousands indirectly, in addition to substantial contributions to the economy, we see ourselves as being one with Nigeria, the country where we have our roots.
