President Bola Tinubu has forwarded two letters to the Nigerian Senate, seeking confirmation of 21 nominees for the boards of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) and the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA).
The requests followed the recent confirmation of the chief executive officers of the two agencies, Oritsemeyiwa Eyesan as CEO of NUPRC and Saidu Aliyu Mohammed as CEO of NMDPRA.
In the first letter, the President nominated Magnus Abe, a former senator representing Rivers South-East, as Chairman of the NUPRC board.
Abe is a former board member of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company and currently Chairs the National Agency of the Great Green Wall.
Other nominees for the NUPRC board include Paul Yaro Jezhi, a former chairman of the Trade Union Congress in Kaduna State, and Mr Sunday Adebayo Babalola, a former deputy director of the defunct Department of Petroleum Resources, to serve as non-executive commissioners.
President Tinubu also nominated seven executive commissioners for the NUPRC board. They are Muhammed Sabo Lamido (Finance); Edu Inyang (Exploration and Acreage); Justin Ezeala (Economic Regulation and Strategic Planning); Henry Darlington Oki (Development and Production); Indabawa Bashari Alka (Corporate Services and Administration); Mahmood Tijani (Health, Safety and Environment); and Ms Olayemi Adeboyejo as Secretary and Legal Adviser.
While Lamido and Adeboyejo were initially appointed in 2022 and Alka in 2023, Inyang, Ezeala, Tijani, Babalola and Jezhi are new nominees of President Tinubu.
In a second letter, the President nominated Mr Adegbite Ebiowei Adeniji as Chairman of the NMDPRA board.
Adeniji, a legal practitioner with over three decades of experience in energy and natural resources, previously served as Special Technical Adviser on upstream and gas matters to the Minister of State for Petroleum and was part of the World Bank Oil and Gas Policy team that advised Nigeria on sector reforms.
Also nominated as non-executive members of the NMDPRA board are Chief Kenneth Kobani, a former Minister of State for Trade, and Mrs Asabe Ahmed.
For executive roles, President Tinubu nominated Abiodun Adeniji (Finance); Francis Ogaree (Hydrocarbon); Oluwole Adama (Midstream and Downstream Gas Infrastructure); and Dr Mustapha Lamorde (Corporate Services and Administration).
In addition, Mr Yahaya Nasamu Yinusa (Distribution Systems); Adeyemi Murtala Aminu (Corporate Services); Ms Modie Ogechukwu (Economic Regulation and Strategic Planning); and Barrister Olawale Dawodu as Board Secretary and Legal Adviser were also nominated.
The President urged the Senate to consider and approve the nominees expeditiously.
President Tinubu charged all nominees and appointees to discharge their duties professionally in strengthening regulation across Nigeria’s oil and gas sector.