PTDF tells Federal Government - Force Oil companies to employ Nigerians

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The Petroleum Technology Development Fund,
PTDF, has called on the Federal Government
to make both local and International Oil Companies
(IOC) operating in the country to employ more Nigerian
oil and gas professionals.

Speaking at the Close Out seminar in Abuja, Executive
Secretary of the Fund, Mr. Femi Ajayi, lamented the
fact that it's not fair for Nigerian professionals to burn
the candle, work hard and graduate with flying colours
then end up unemployed.

According to him, the Federal Government needs to put
in place, measures that will ensure that both local and
international oil companies employ indigenous
professionals, especially scholars of the PTDF
scholarship scheme.

He said,
“The issue is not just competence and capability,
there is also the need for political will among the
IOCs and the government. We cannot rely on
the goodwill of the IOCs when it comes to the
issue of employing of our people; they have to be
compelled to do it.”

He emphasized the need for all stakeholders in the
petroleum industry to contribute their quota towards
ensuring that indigenous professionals are gainfully
engaged and also that the funds and efforts expended in
training these professionals are not futile.

“When we train all these people, give them the
research competence and the experience that they
have, there is the issue of getting them gainfully
engaged locally.

‘There are certain roles that government should
play and the role that the private sector needs to
play; everyone needs to play their individual roles,
because at the end of the day, if we put so much
money to train these people, yet it does not lead to
domestication of some of these things that we
want domesticated, it means we are just spending
money, we are not getting the results,” he noted.

Ajayi, however, commended the federal Government for
setting up the Nigerian Content Development
Management Board, NCDMB, urging the government
to empower the agencies and others to deliver on the
mandate.

He further stated:
“There is no running away from funding, training,
research and development. It is not by accident
that the most technological advanced countries in
the world, they have the best communication
systems, they have the most reliable power
systems, they have the most efficient transport
systems, and it is not by accident. So if you want
any of these things, you must fund training, you
must fund research and development.”
Vanguard

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