Olamide Francis
The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, has said that the National Gas Expansion Programme will provide at least two million jobs per annum, Nature News gathered.
The minister made this statement at the Presidential roll out of the National Gas Expansion Programme (NGEP) and National Autogas Initiative in Abuja, stating that the programme would focus on improving the lives of its citizens, building of indigenous technical expertise and stimulating other sectors of the economy to address unemployment amongst youths.
While lamenting that the project has been a major challenge despite increased activities in the oil and gas sector, Sylva said it is time for the country to start thinking of the long-term development strategy to grow our economy in real terms.
“We must as one country, think of the long term development strategy to grow our economy in real terms. A significant part of this is the harnessing of our natural gas resources to focus on manufacturing and productivity. Not until this is done can we achieve the desired results.
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“In January of this year, I inaugurated the national gas expansion programme as a mechanism to boost utilisation of natural gas in the short and medium term. This is part of the federal government’s bid to key into the global shift from crude oil to gas and other renewable sources of energy as reemphasized in my declaration of the year 2020 as the year of gas.
“The availability of autogas as an alternative fuel will afford Nigerians cheaper, cleaner and additional choice of fuel cheaper than the price of PMS, cleaner for our environment and better for our automobile and other engines. This shift to gas underscores Mr President’s seriousness and determination in the development of Nigeria’s vast gas resources. “
The Group Managing Director Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mele Kyari, noted that petrol subsidy has been the bane to Nigeria’s prosperity and incapacity build critical infrastructure, improve the economy, extract service investment and generate jobs for the people.
Revealing that N3 trillion was spent in the space of three years, from 2016 to 2019 subsidising pump price of petroleum products particularly PMS, he insisted that the subsidy regime did not benefit the masses whom the President was passionate about, adding that the economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic have made it impossible to continue with the onerous subsidy regime.
“Due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the country lacks the resources required to sustain the various subsidy regime. The federal government being aware of the potential impact of this decision on the cost of transportation, initiated the transition to auto gas as a cheaper alternative for us aimed at deepening domestic gas utilisation.”
Kyari further disclosed that the NNPC was providing free conversion service in some selected NNPC retail stations to assist interested motorists switch from PMS to auto gas, especially in areas with existing auto gas service stations in the Federal Capital territory, Kaduna, Kano, Ogun, Kogi, Kwara, Ondo, Oyo, Lagos, Edo, Delta, Rivers and Bayelsa states.
The NNPC chief projected that about a million vehicles will be converted to gas by the end of 2021 and an expansion of the initiative to all NNPC retail stations across the nation, assuring motorists of steady availability of auto gas at competitive prices.
