University of Benin (left) and former Adviser to
the President on Petroleum, Dr Emmanuel
Egbogah, inspecting a car built by students of the
institution for the Shell Eco-marathon competition
at the 2015 conference and exhibition of the
Society for Petroleum Engineers, in Lagos.
By Clara Nwachukwu
Chrome Group, a fast growing indigenous
conglomerate has reiterated the need for more
jobs to be given Nigerian companies to boost
capacity development and technology transfer in
the nation’s petroleum industry. The Group said
this is the only way to boost Federal
Government’s objective in Nigerian Content
development, even as its subsidiary, Kaztec
Engineering Limited, recently won an $84.5million
rehabilitation contract for Shell’s Trans Niger
Pipeline, TNP, as part of the pipeline integrity
fortification.
Speaking to journalists at the weekend, the
Executive Chairman, Chrome Group, Sir Emeka
Offor, argued that content development cannot be
achieved by professional certification alone, but
by job execution and hands on experience.
According to him, “If you have the professional
qualification and no jobs, how are you going to
gain the experience and transfer technology? But
where we (Chrome Group) are now, we have the
opportunity and the facility to boost content
development and technology transfer.
Capital flight
He noted that most of the fabrication jobs in the
industry are still ceded offshore to fabrication
yards in China, Malaysia, South Korea, Japan and
a host of others leading to capital flight, even
while Nigerians have continued to demonstrate
the capacity to do these jobs.
He said: “Most of the jobs are done by heavy
fabrication countries like China, Malaysia, South
Korea, Japan, and if that continues to happen,
there will continue to be foreign exchange flight
every day, and which will impact negatively on
the value of our Naira.”
He however, chided indigenous companies to
prove their capacity, saying that getting jobs from
the international oil companies, IOCs, is not about
playing politics. He said: “To get an IOC job, they
must audit your company and certify that you
have both the manpower and the facility to
compete. You have to drag the bull by the horns
to be able to compete with other IOCs like
Saipem and the rest.
And if we are not able to deliver it is also a
problem because we won’t get more jobs; but we
are getting the jobs because we deliver as
promised. The IOCs give you a target, and you
must deliver and if you’re not able to, then you’re
out. So getting jobs are tied to performance, not
politics, and they don’t accept excuses because
the jobs are tied to their production and output.”
Kaztec capacity
Accordingly, he said Kaztec, an indigenous
engineering, procurement, installation and
construction, EPIC company, has done a number
of works for Addax in its fabrication yard at the
Snake Island, reputed as the biggest in the
country. He added that Shell and other IOCs have
also come on board based on the company’s
track record to deliver on schedule.
Expatiating on the Shell pipeline job, Kaztec
Project Director, Mr. Tochukwu Odukwe, said, “The
Trans Niger Pipeline is a 12.5km project, worth
about $84.5m of 30 inch pipeline located in
Ogoni, Rivers State. The project is in phases; but
so far, we have done the engineering, we have
mobilised to site and about to proceed to
procurement and construction.”
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