Nigeria: NNPCL Insiders Defend Ojulari, Say He Lacks Authority to Award Oil Blocks
Insiders at the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) have pushed back against allegations that the company’s Group Chief Executive Officer, Bayo Ojulari, awarded any oil block, insisting that the licensing of petroleum acreages falls outside his statutory remit, according to AllAfrica reporting that drew on Premium Times coverage.
Under Nigeria’s Petroleum Industry Act of 2021, the authority to award and administer oil blocks rests with the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), not the national oil company. NNPCL insiders, as cited by AllAfrica, said critics had either misunderstood the legal framework or were deliberately misrepresenting Ojulari’s role to undermine his leadership and the broader restructuring of the company.
The defence comes amid a wave of public criticism directed at NNPCL’s management over its stewardship of Nigeria’s oil sector, which remains the country’s largest source of government revenue and foreign exchange earnings. Since assuming office, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has pursued sweeping reforms across the petroleum industry, including the full commercialisation of NNPCL, the removal of the long-standing fuel subsidy, and efforts to channel more revenue through formal channels.
According to AllAfrica, company insiders described the allegations as part of a coordinated effort by reform opponents to derail transparency, cost-cutting and operational changes at the state-owned enterprise. They argued that the false claims risk distracting the public and policymakers from the genuine challenges of modernising an institution long criticised for opacity and inefficiency.
NNPCL was reconstituted as a limited liability company under the Petroleum Industry Act, a move intended to wean it from dependence on government funding and subject it to commercial discipline. Supporters of the reforms say institutional change of this magnitude routinely attracts resistance from entrenched interests, while critics maintain that accountability mechanisms remain weak in a sector that contributes the bulk of Nigeria’s export earnings.
Sources
This report was written from coverage published by the following news organisations. Follow the links for the original reporting.
