14 February 2012, Sweetcrude, LAGOS – Nigeria says foreign investors partnering indigenous fabrication companies has nothing to fear about as their local facilities would be utilised before recourse to foreign yards.
Minister of Petroleum, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke, gave the assurance in Lagos, Monday, saying once there is a conflict between executing a project in Nigeria and sending it oversreas, she was always in favour of such project being executed in the country.
She spoke as she visited the Lagos Deep Offshore Logistics (LADOL) base, as part of the ongoing assessment of local facilities, aimed at further pushing the Nigerian Content (NC) policy.
After inspecting Nigerdock facilities in Snake Island, the minister expressed satisfaction that LADOL is 100 per cent indigenously-owned company, for which the promoters had strategic thinking and took calculated risks far before the inception of the Nigerian Content.
She said: “For Nigeria to grow and progress in the oil and gas sector in the way and manner that government would intend it to grow and would like to support it to grow, we need the combined efforts of the stakeholders and visionaries such as those who are behind the creation of LADOL.”
Accompanied by Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB), Mr. Ernest Nwapa, Alison-Madueke commended the operations and proposed projects in LADOL and Nigerdock, and assured the foreign companies partnering the two Nigerian entities of the Federal Government’s support.
“The fact that LADOL is a 100 per cent indigenously-owned facility for which the promoters had a long term strategic thinking and vision, way back taking calculated risks to actually start the implementation of a facility such as this, 10 years as they say, before the Nigerian Content actually came, is extremely encouraging to us. I think that they could not have been more proactive and strategic than they have been,” she added.
Earlier in her presentation, the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of LADOL, Dr. Amy Jadesimi noted that LADOL had executed world-class projects, including the final installation of the Floating Production Storage Offloading (FPSO) of Chevron’s Agbami deepwater field, which is currently producing 250,000 barrels of crude oil per day.
According to her, Chevron, Technip, Subsea 7 Limited and FMC all worked from LADOL to complete the installation of the FPSO.
