Shell claims awarding $1.9bn contracts to Nigerian firms in 2022

Mkpoikana Udoma

Port Harcourt — Shell companies in Nigeria says it awarded contracts worth $1.9 billion to Nigerian companies in 2022.

Shell Nigeria made this disclosure as it reacted to allegations that it was in violation of Nigerian Content laws in awarding contracts to indigenous players from its hosts communities in the Niger Delta.

The Ijaw Youth Council, IYC, had threatened to shut down operations of Shell in the Niger Delta over alleged deprivation of host communities and local contractors in the oil and gas sector of jobs, in violation of Community Content guidelines set out by the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board, NCDMB.

National spokesman of the IYC, Ebilade Ekerefe, said despite the intervention of senior officials of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, NNPC, officials of the Shell Petroleum Development Company, SPDC, have terminated jobs meant for indigenous contractors.

Ekerefe claimed that contracts, which ought to be awarded to local contractors and jobs meant for host communities in the Niger Delta region are being given to relatives of expatriates and other Nigerians at the helm of affairs of the multinationals, depriving the locals of their rights.

The IYC spokesman noted that local contractors from the region have met all procurement requirements by the certifying bodies in the country to qualify to be awarded such contracts and be gainfully employed in those fields, but frowned at the actions of the SPDC and other oil multinationals.

Reacting to the allegations of breach of the Nigerian Oil and Gas Industry Content Development, NOGICD, Act, Shell said that on the contrary, it was a leading player in the development of local capacity in the oil and gas sector.

The Media Relations Manager, Shell Nigeria, Mrs. Abimbola Essien-Nelson, who stated that Shell companies in Nigeria awarded contracts worth $1.9 billion to Nigerian companies in 2022 alone, also said the company works with the NCDMB in building capacity of Nigerian companies in the oil and gas sector.

According to her, the case raised by IYC was a review supervised by the NNPC and NCDMB via an open and transparent bidding process which resulted in the entrance of several new contractors.

Essien-Nelson said all the bid winners, which are Nigerian companies, have commercial and technical competence as well as compliance with Nigerian Content regulations.

“The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited Joint Venture (SPDC JV) is committed to the development of businesses in the Niger Delta.

“Working with government and community stakeholders, we have supported capacity development in several Niger Delta-owned businesses.

“The case in hand is a scheduled review of our logistics contracting process that has been in place for years. The review, supervised by the NNPC Upstream Investments Management Services (NUIMS), and the Nigerian Content Development & Monitoring Board (NCDMB), was conducted via an open and transparent bidding process which resulted in the entrance of several new contractors.

“The bid winners consisted some of these new companies, as well as companies previously involved in the contract. All the bid winners, which are Nigerian companies, demonstrated their commercial and technical competence as well as compliance with Nigerian Content regulations,” SPDC stated.