We Are Working To Make Nigeria A Gas Nation – Official

Olalekan Ogunleye, Managing Director, Gas Aggregation Company Nigeria Limited (GACN), has said that the company was working towards ensuring Nigeria becomes a gas-industrialized nation.

Ogunleye said this when the management of GACN paid a courtesy visit to Buki Ponle, Managing Director (MD) of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), in Abuja on Thursday.

The visit was to seek NAN’s collaboration on information dissemination of the company’s activities toward achieving increased gas utilization in the country.

Ogunleye, represented by Chijioke Uzoho, Commercial Manager, GACN, said the company was also working to put the gas consumption to national use.

“We are into natural gas, Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) or Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), and natural gas drives industrialization; you must have heard about the Escravos in Lagos and the industrialization in Lagos and Ogun.

“Industries in those states are tracking the Escravos pipeline because that is where they source their energy and electricity to meet their industrial requirements.

“Critical to us is the national industrialization using gas, and Nigeria has been described as a gas nation.

“Before 2010, most of the projects were export-focused, so the initiative of GACN is to be able to catalyze the utilization of gas in-country, to be able to drive industries, and things that come from it including employment,” Ogunleye said.

According to him, stakeholders’ summits have been designed with the South East taking the first shot, to sensitize the zone on the benefits accruing from natural gas.

“The first stakeholders’ gas forum we organized was in the South East where we brought the governors, the industries, business moguls in major cities in the South East, as well as the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN).

“We also brought the supplier of the gas so that we can find a solution to the energy needs or the gas requirements for these end-users; it was a successful forum because the NNPC GMD and the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources participated.

“So, this year, we are replicating the same in the North on July 29 in Kano, and we have tagged it the AKK Forum, (Ajaokuta, Kaduna, Kano pipeline).

“Hopefully, the president will be there and the governors of the AKK Pipeline surrounding states – Nasarawa, Kogi, Kano, Kaduna, and Abuja will be there.

“Not everybody knows what this pipeline has been designed for. So, this is sensitization for the region for them to know that this pipeline is coming and that it is coming with a massive amount of gas.

“The gas pipeline will be able to industrialize that area, but for the people to start to build industries based on gas utilization, we need to let them know that this is available and that the gas is coming,” he added.

Ogunleye noted that Nigeria had not been able to utilize its gas resources the way it ought to be but that the stability in products like fertilizer engineered through gas, was a sign of a benefitting gas future in the country.

“In achieving our target, we have stakeholders from upstream and we try to put the gas in the market for off-takers, so we are like a one-stop-shop to the extent that if an entity needs gas, all they need to do is to come to us and tap into the process.”

Responding, the MD of NAN, represented by the Editor-in-Chief, Silas Nwoha, assured the company of the Agency’s readiness to ensure it achieved its target.

Ponle said NAN had been serving the country since 1978 and would not hesitate to extend its services to the gas company to ensure the country achieved its gas industrialization target.

“We have been partnering with agencies and organizations to achieve their mandate and yours will not be different.

“We know what to do and we will always do that to project your organization through our various news platforms including the website and multimedia.

 

NAN