Business
FG frustrating downstream deregulation, PENGASSAN alleges
The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, PENGASSAN, branch of the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency, PPPRA, Friday, said the Federal Government has been frustrating the efforts of the PPPRA to effectively regulate the downstream sector of the Nigerian petroleum industry with the appointment of staff of operating and marketing companies the agency regulates to head it.
According to the workers, the decision of the Federal Government, from 2008, to always appoint executive secretaries of the PPPRA from agencies regulated by the PPPRA had helped in no small measure in making the agency ineffective and lacking in autonomy.
Read also: PPPRA, DPR workers kick against new PIB
This was stated in Abuja by Comrade Victor Ononokpono, Chairman, PENGASSAN, PPPRA Branch, adding that the persistent deployment of staff of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, to head the PPPRA is a contravention of the PPPRA Act that grants it autonomy and independence.
According to him, the appointment of officers from operating/marketing companies to head a critical regulatory agency like the PPPRA is unthinkable and is in bad taste.
“Portions of the Act of the PPPRA had remained unattainable under the regime of having operatives of operating company head the regulator. How do you regulate your bosses? How do you query your pay master? How do we align with global best practices? How do we promote control and checks in corporate governance? These are the questions the protest seeks answers to.”
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