ORJI Ogbonaya Orji is the Executive Secretary of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI). In this exclusive interview with the ICIR, he spoke on a wide range of issues affecting the oil, gas and mining sectors, dwelling on the mandate of the transparency watchdog in driving accountability. Excerpts:

ICIR: Last year, you clocked four years of your tenure as the Executive Secretary of NEITI. Fast forward to this year, around March, you were quoted during a press conference as saying: “We inherited an institution at crossroads…” Can you briefly take us through your journey at NEITI so far?

 Orji: My journey is quite long and a story that could be told for a whole day, even a whole month if I have to. But I think I need to be brief. I came into NEITI in 2010 after a competitive interview process. By then, I was Special Adviser, Communication, to the then Minister of Information. But my path with NEITI crossed in 2005 when I was working at the Presidential Villa with Oby Ezekwesili under the public procurement reforms.

Under her leadership, she had two projects. The first was public procurement reforms. The second was extractive sector reforms through the framework of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), which Nigeria had joined.

I was engaged as Director of Communications in NEITI in 2010 — a role that exposed me to working very closely with civil society, the media, the public sector, and extractive companies in the area of public education, enlightenment, and advocacy. I served in that capacity for 11 years and six months. During this period, we developed a comprehensive communication strategy twice, which we implemented. The visibility and public knowledge that NEITI has today were as a result of that team, which I led.

I assumed my current role in 2021, precisely February 19, 2021, following the expiration of the tenure of the former Executive Secretary, my friend and brother, Waziri Adio, from whom I took I over. What I meant by “at crossroads” was that I assumed office at the emergence of COVID-19. when Nigeria was under lockdown — 2020, 2021. The whole world almost collapsed because of COVID.

At that time, public attention was more on repositioning global public health. Donor funding was being channelled towards public health, and there was nothing left for extractives. That’s why I said we were at a crossroads, because the impact of COVID was heavy on NEITI and on the EITI globally.

Secondly, by the time I took over, NEITI had no permanent accommodation. We were in an abandoned property under AMCON, which we were paying rent for. That place was nothing befitting — just two flats where a lot of people were congested together. The owner of the building was already on our neck, having sent several letters for ejection.

To the staff I had worked with — and I knew them inside out — morale was very low, including mine, because of poor access to budgets, poor funding, lack of training, and a lot of other issues.

I quickly addressed staff to reassure them that, yes, I was part of management over these years, but now in charge. Some of them didn’t believe me because I was still the same person among them all these years. But when you are in charge, there is always a difference; you can now make decisions.

The first decision I made was to secure a permanent office — to address institutional legacy and sustenance. Because I didn’t know how long we would continue begging government for accommodation.

The second was to energise staff capacity. At that time, we were barely less than 43 in total staff strength — including drivers. Graduate staff that could really get things done were less than 32. And if you removed those on secondment or outside postings, we had very little capacity. Oil companies would even ask us, “How will you, these few people, gather this much data?”

The third was to provide tools to work, including digitalising our procedures. I also assured staff that I was going to tackle welfare issues and improve budgetary allocations to NEITI.

More importantly, I planned to expand our content — engagement, industrial reporting, dissemination, public education, enlightenment, and remediation. I listed seven items. The last was to review the NEITI Act.

When I look back — and you can cross-check from my staff — I’ve done all except one: the review of the NEITI Act. NEITI now has a permanent office building. I recruited 70 more staff, raising the strength from 43 to 118 as we speak. I expanded training opportunities. I reviewed upwards the salaries and emoluments of staff to boost productivity and morale.

I also expanded international partnerships. Currently, in the process of digitalisation, we are building a data centre. My simple policy is that every staff must have tools to work — laptops, phones, everything.

So, like I said, out of the seven promises, I have fulfilled six fully and verifiably. The only one outstanding is the review of the NEITI Act, and that’s because it is complex and involves divergent interests. But I think that’s good because whoever succeeds me must have something to work on.

I must say that I achieved all these with the support of the past and present administration. First, late President Muhammadu Buhari who gave me the privilege to serve NEITI and our country at the highest level and to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu who sustained the appointed, strengthened deepened and expanded the support. The National Stakeholders Working Groups (NSGs) that I worked with are equally supportive.

ICIR: At the core of your mandate is advancing transparency and accountability in Nigeria’s oil, gas, and mining sectors. To what extent would you say you have achieved this mandate so far?

Orji: To a large extent, we have gone far. The cup is more than half full than half empty. We have not got there, but we’ve made very significant progress.

Within the space that I took over, the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) was passed into law. I served on the implementation committee for the PIA.

The NNPC that used to be wholly public has gone private. The transition is not yet completed, but the NNPC has gone private. Under the PIA, in terms of advancing transparency, we now have two strong regulators: one for the downstream, another one for the upstream.

I was with the Chief Executive of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, and we had extensive discussions on advancing and deepening reforms. Now, you cannot award oil and gas assets by complimentary cards. It has to be advertised. Bidding rounds are conducted openly, and they are raising a lot of revenue for government.

So, for NEITI, our obligation is advocacy — supporting these reforms with credible data and information. That has been our lead responsibility.

I was also with the GCEO of NNPC. We outlined certain corporate responsibilities in terms of transparency. We advised him to follow through, and we have already set up a technical committee. We’re drafting an MoU on our rules of engagement, specifically on transparency in that sector.

For the wider oil and gas companies, we work with the Oil Producers Trade Section (OPTS) of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce on the same issue of transparency. The responsibility of the IOCs to Nigeria, to the corporate world, and the private sector has been heightened.

Using the NEITI framework, we are calling attention to oil theft. Using the NEITI framework, we are calling attention to revenue remittances. Using the NEITI framework, we are widening the space for civil society to scrutinise what is going on in the sector.

Before, nobody had information on oil and gas — production data, export data, domestic consumption data, subsidy data. All that information is now in the public domain.

For instance, I can tell you at the touch of a button how much Nigeria has earned from oil and gas since 1999 to date. We’re in the region of $831.15 billion between 1999 and today. In solid minerals, you have almost ₦1.5 trillion between 2007, when we began to collect data, and now.

In terms of availability of information and data, NEITI has made impact. In terms of advocacy for reforms, working with the National Assembly and relevant committees, the oil and gas industry is now wider open.

Have we got to a level where our sector operates like it is done in the developed world? No. But the journey has started, and our job will not be done until the sector is open, accountable, and impactful in terms of poverty reduction to Nigerians. It’s a process, and we have not given up. We’re pushing.

ICIR:  But there still seems to be secrecy surrounding the country’s oil and gas contracts. What is NEITI doing to address this issue?

Orji: When the EITI began in Nigeria in 2003, we began implementation in 2004. The focus then was on revenue disclosure — payments by companies and receipts by government.

Since then, the EITI has moved from revenue disclosure to data mainstreaming, open data. From open data to beneficial ownership disclosure — to know who owns oil and gas assets. From beneficial ownership, we moved to open government partnership, which provides collaboration among agencies to share knowledge and information on disclosure.

Currently, we are at the level of domestic resource mobilisation using the EITI framework. The next one, which you just mentioned, is contract transparency.

Contract transparency is a requirement in the global EITI standard. As you may be aware, I was elected chairman of the Contract Transparency Network globally by the EITI, comprising 22 countries. I chaired that for a year and I’m about handing over to the next global chair.

But one of the issues is that we are yet to really agree on a framework for disclosure. For Nigeria, our engagement with the NNPC, NUPRC, NMDPRA, and all the relevant agencies is centred on questions: At what point do we disclose contracts? Is it at conception, signing, implementation, monitoring and evaluation, or at project exit?

How will these disclosures affect or jeopardise the interest of competing companies and partners? If I’m signing a contract with Shell, how will disclosure not jeopardise similar contracts by other companies? These are the issues we’re debating.

Have other countries defined it? Some may have, but I am not aware of any that has fully resolved it. Is contract transparency implementable? Yes. Have we started? Yes. Consultations have started.

But the way the EITI works is that companies, civil society, and government must all agree. Civil society pushes from the angle of public conscience and morality. Companies push from the angle of profit protection. Government provides institutional ownership. The convergence of these three is still being worked out.

ICIR: With the global shift towards cleaner energy, how is NEITI positioning Nigeria’s extractive industries to adapt to this energy transition?

Orji: For Nigeria, it’s a reality we cannot ignore. But we approach it considering our national interest and sovereignty. What sustains Nigeria now is oil and gas revenue. Government is just beginning to expand to the non-oil sector — ICT, entertainment, agriculture, and so on.

But oil has sustained us, and it’s what governors gather every month to share. Energy transition suggests that oil will give way to green energy. Our question is: when that happens, what happens to jobs? To the budget? To revenue that sustains the country? To energy security? To livelihoods tied to oil and gas?

Developed countries are ready — they have Teslas, carbon-free cars, renewable infrastructure. Are we ready in Nigeria? Our infrastructure cannot support it immediately. Our institutions are not ready.

For NEITI, we commissioned a study on the impact of energy transition on the Nigerian economy with support from the Ford Foundation. We are reviewing the interim report. We want an empirical basis for engaging government on a national policy.

Government has developed a national energy transition plan with a net-zero target of 2060. But the road to 2060 has not fully started. The vehicle has not moved — maybe it’s still loading.

ICIR: Let’s talk about your industry reports. Can you discuss specific instances where these reports have directly influenced policy reforms or led to tangible changes in the extractive industries?

Orji: Our reports have led to revenue recoveries. And when revenues are recovered and remitted to government, it influences policy. The amount of money available affects the kind of projects government undertakes.

Our reports also improved government’s understanding of the importance of data in national planning. In the past, planning was done without facts. Now, government relies on credible data.

Our interventions raised awareness of corruption and its consequences on development and poverty reduction. We name and shame, we expose. This has led to government strengthening sanctions and incentives in institutions to hold people accountable.

We were behind the implementation of the FOI Act, working with civil society organisations like Media Rights Agenda.

Another area is investment. NEITI reports are circulated globally and feed into the Natural Resource Governance Index. Investors look at that index before making decisions.

We also share information with anti-corruption agencies. Many ongoing investigations rely on NEITI data, especially revenue-related.

We were instrumental to the Petroleum Industry Act. Before it, the only law was the Petroleum Act of 1959. Our recommendations influenced the PIA’s passage.

So, in revenue recovery, remittances, planning, corruption fight, legal framework, investment, and data transparency — our reports have been very impactful.

Before NEITI, the industry was completely black — nobody knew what was going on. Today, because of the Act, we have strong institutions regulating the industry.

In other words, we’re owing over $6.07 billion. I named the companies; we named exactly what each company is owing. I’m not satisfied that all the revenues have been recovered — no.

I’m also not satisfied with the transition of the NNPC to a limited liability company. We should have moved faster than we have. I’m also not satisfied that after the PIA was passed, there was no well-grounded, stakeholder-developed implementation strategy to drive the reform.

In the solid minerals sector, I’m not satisfied with the level of development. Efforts have been made, but those efforts haven’t taken us to where we should be. Our recommendations on how to reform the solid minerals sector are clear, visible, and available.

ICIR: In terms of divestment of assets and liabilities with the PIA on stream, how do the companies that take over manage the process so that we don’t lose from both ends when we have divestment of assets?

Orji: Divestment of assets, in the way in Nigeria we used to look at this, is not also right. People were reporting it as if it was because companies were packing out of Nigeria to other destinations. It’s not really so. Divestment of assets comes in three major areas.

One, expansion of capacity or production. Some companies now look at where they have competitive advantage. Is it in the upstream, deep water, shallow water, or completely in the downstream sector? So, they maximise their capital expenses and make investment decisions.

That’s one area. The other area is the fact that Nigerian companies are now controlling over 60 per cent of oil production in Nigeria. Nigerian companies are now buying over assets owned by IOCs, which is a good development. Renaissance Group just took over one of the IOC’s concerns. Oando just took over.

These consortiums are now asserting themselves in both downstream and upstream operations. But to answer your question specifically, when companies divest, that means they are leaving a particular operation to another jurisdiction, or they are leaving the country entirely, whichever is the case.

There are implications. There are implications for jobs that will be laid off. There are implications for environments that may be polluted as a result of abandoned oil wells.

There are also host community implications, because some of these responsibilities that the companies have for them might be jeopardised. So, we developed a policy framework, working with civil society, that brought this up. It wasn’t there before.

We weren’t capturing that in our reports. But beginning from 2024, it’s going to occupy a place in our report. That when you are leaving a particular operation, you must take responsibility for environmental violations that may have occurred and put the place back as it was when you started.

You must also take responsibility for jobs that may have been lost by ensuring that all those jobs are fully compensated. You must equally take responsibility for the community responsibilities that you were responsible for before. Some of these companies, during operation, are responsible for hospitals, schools, and the welfare of those communities.

You don’t just leave those communities anyhow. You don’t just wake up one morning and say, you’ve gone. No.

There must be a discussion. There must be accountability. That’s why we developed what we call the Climate, Energy Transition, Divestment, and Climate Accountability Framework.

It’s a policy that came out of our board meeting held in Umuahia from May 6-9 this year. We have shared that with civil society. We have developed an implementation plan. We are also developing a template for this to be captured in our Oil and Gas 2024 report. The first thing is to know where these divestments are located. You have to know where they are, how they are involved.

ICIR: What specific oversight mechanism is NEITI implementing to its Energy Transition and Climate Accountability Framework, and how will the public know the benefit of sales to Nigeria, rather than just serving as convenient exits for international companies?

Orji: It’s all contained in that framework, and we’ve just developed it. We’ve just captured it. We don’t want to go into advocacy and engagement without credible data.

Like I said, implementation will start with this current report. When this report is published, hopefully by the end of the year, the recommendations will be specific and clear. Now, what happens when you develop a framework is that you share it with those who know more than you.

You share it with the companies that are going to divest. They have to provide information on what they are divesting, provide information on the responsibilities they had before, information on what they have done in the past with the environment, information on what they will not do now that they are going. The communities where they are operating also have a say.

Do not say, we have been working with this company during their stay, these are the things they were doing. Our question, now that you are leaving, what happens to these responsibilities you were providing before? We don’t say you should remain there forever.

You could come in form of compensation. Because you are leaving, there are backlogs you may not have paid. Some just leave with a lot of backlogs.

If there are remittances they were doing, schools they were building, hospitals they started, but they may not have paid the contractor — they may just leave and go. Once they leave, the job stops. We say, no, you have started this project, sort it out before you go.

Because there are responsibilities that need to be accounted for. That’s all we say. We are able to speak specifically on those responsibilities and their cost when we have done this report.

ICIR: You recently released a policy document tagged ‘Beyond Federal Allocations: The Cost of Borrowing and Debt Servicing at State Level in Nigeria’; what actually is the objective of this policy brief?

Well, you know, most developing countries are always exposed to debts and borrowing. And that is always the easiest way to address capital funding gaps in their local operations. But while there’s so much awareness about how much we are owing at the federal level, no information is available to many at the state level.

You know at the federal level, institutions are stronger. You can see the National Assembly inviting public officials openly and televising it, having engagements with them on certain issues. Have you ever seen any such engagement by any state house of assembly with a commissioner or anybody being invited to give account? State governments’ legislative engagement at the state level is so low and almost being controlled by governors.

I’m not a politician. I don’t want to go into politics. But I’m looking at this in front of you. So, we know that most states, from that policy brief, have borrowed so heavily that by the time after FAAC meeting, revenues are released, even before they have access to a dime of that — what is due to them — there’s instant deduction because they tie some of these debts to direct deduction. Some states lose almost 30 percent of their revenue every month, deducted at source.

If these deductions are tied to projects, you now understand. But some of them are tied to debts that the people of the state cannot have an idea how it came about. So we highlighted that in the policy brief and shared that widely.

Our point is that if borrowing at state level is not checked, the expectations of the average citizens for rural electricity, markets, primary health care, and all that at that level will continue to be in vain, because the government you are waiting for to provide doesn’t have the money.

The other one is that policy brief also highlighted the importance of internally generated revenue, which most states ignore. Most of them just wait and come to Abuja to be given handouts in the form of FAAC allocations. The third one we highlighted there was on the implication of debts, huge debts, to rural development.

You know that the state governments are the nearest at that level. That Debt Management Office should be equipped with technocrats and professionals who could, from time to time, call attention to the magnitude of debts that are mounting. We don’t have any of that since 2002 or 2003.

The Debt Management Office here in Nigeria at the federal level has existed, providing sound advisory services to guide debt management at the federal level. But those kinds of advice are not going down to the subnational level. Under the EITI mandate of domestic resource mobilization, we published that policy brief.

And I’m using this opportunity to also say that the next policy brief we’ll be releasing next week is on implementation of the new tax laws. There are four, five tax laws that have just been released and signed into law. Implementation will start in January 2026.

Nigerians are yet to understand how this will affect them. So that policy brief will explain some of these intricacies and the details. And then we specifically advised on how this can be implemented to address the concerns and fears that citizens may have to deal with.

Fidelis Mac-Leva

Fidelis Mac-Leva is the Deputy Editor of The ICIR/Head of Investigation. He has previously worked with several media outfits in Nigeria, including DAILY TIMES and DAILY TRUST. A compellingly readable Features writer, his forte is Public Interest Journalism which enables him to "comfort the afflicted and afflict the comforted..." He can be reached via fmacleva@icirnigeria.org, @FidelisLeva on X