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Oil thievery is adversely affecting Nigeria’s economy – Shell

By on July 9, 2013

The Managing Director of Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC), Mutiu Sunmonu has warned that continuous oil theft and pipeline vandalism in the Niger-Delta will continue to have adverse effects on the nation’s economy.

Sunmonu, who made this known at the launch of Shell’s partnership and beneficiary Network, noted that the federal government would not generate enough revenue as a result of oil theft in the country.

He hinted that even the Minister of Finance had confirmed its negative impact as it was affecting the state allocations and the capital market.

“The impact of the crude oil thieves and illegal refineries in the Delta is that the Nigerian economy is now in crisis situation. About few weeks ago, I got a frantic phone call from the Minister of Finance. She said ‘MD when are you going to open our pipelines’. I said well, it is still down. We are still trying to keep the crude oil thieves at bay.

“She said ‘Please let me know what I can do to help you because we can’t even pay state allocation for this month’. So that is how bad the issue of crude oil thieves is affecting the economy of this country”, he lamented.

The SPDC boss, however expressed some hope that the crime would soon be curbed, as according to him, President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration was working hard to halt all crude oil related crimes in the country.