By Hector Igbikiowubo, Clara Nwachukwu, Yemie Adeoye & Oscarline Onwuemenyi
ABUJA — AS the oil and gas sector in the country eagerly awaits the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, the Federal Government has announced that with the passage of the bill, oil producing communities will begin to receive over $600 million as annual dividends, just as the Presidency urged the National Assembly to ensure the enactment of the PIB before the end of the present administration in May.

Speaking at the on-going Nigerian Oil and Gas conference, NOG 2011, in Abuja, Minister for Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke, assured hosts to oil producing companies that an essential part of the reform was to ensure that the members of all oil producing communities become shareholders of the resources.

The minister who was represented at the conference by the Group Executive Director, Exploration and Production, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, Mr. Andrew Yakubu, said over $600 million was estimated as annual dividend payment to the communities.

“Over $600 million is estimated as annual dividend payments to be disbursed to the hosting communities of oil and gas producing facilities or directly impacted by the operations,” she said.

Meanwhile, the Federal Government has reiterated its commitment to the passage of the controversial PIB before the end of this tenure.

Speaking at the opening ceremony on Monday, President Goodluck Jonathan said the PIB would finally be passed after years of delay before the end of this administration even as stakeholders and oil executives said privately they were unconvinced the reforms would come ahead of April presidential and parliamentary elections.

President Jonathan who was represented by his Special Adviser on Petroleum Matters, Dr. Emmanuel Egbogah,  said “We are assured in the next couple of weeks, well before the end of this administration, the PIB will be passed into law,”.

He said the terms of the bill would make the deep offshore acreage, where most of its future production potential lies, attractive to investors.

“The terms for the deep offshore and other places are very, very competitive, and we have assured that our government take will not exceed 65 per cent. It is much better than our closest competitor Angola and many other jurisdictions,” he said.

The Managing Director of Chevron, Andrew Fawthrop, said he would reserve his judgment for now. “We need to see the whole bill and how the pieces fit together. This thing is like a water balloon you reduce deepwater to 65 per cent and that pushes it in, but what else pops out,” he stated.