Federal Government may have raked at least N2tn from the 2020/2021 marginal oil field bid rounds, according to findings by our correspondent.
In the Nigerian context, marginal fields include fields with reported reserves and production potential, which are however deemed marginal for a variety of reasons. Notably, marginal fields exist under current Oil Mining Leases.
After 18 years of the last bid rounds, Nigeria through the defunct Department of Petroleum Resources, put up 57 onshore, swamp, and shallow offshore terrains fields for bidding, and had set May 1, 2022 for the issuance of licences to winners.
However, the licences were not issued due to delays in payments of the fees and bonuses by the winners of the oil fields, unconfirmed sources close to the situation said.
Findings showed that each of the awardees paid a total of N48bn (fees and bonuses) to gain access the licence, resulting in combined revenue of over N2tr for the Federal Government.
A breakdown of the N48bn include: N500, 000 registration fee, N2m application per field, N3m bid processing fee, data prying fee of $15, 000 per field, data leasing fee of $25, 000 per field, competent persons report fee of $50, 000 per field, and $25, 000 per field for field specific report.
This brings the total payment to approximately N48bn per awardees.