Tinubu seeks senate confirmation for 21 nominees to petroleum regulatory boards
President Bola Tinubu has written two separate letters to the Senate seeking confirmation of 21 nominees for the boards of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) and the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA).
In the first letter, the President nominated Senator Magnus Abe as chairman of the NUPRC board. Abe, who represented Rivers South East Senatorial District for two terms, previously served on the board of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and is currently chairman of the National Agency for the Great Green Wall.
A statement issued on Monday by the President’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, disclosed that other nominees for the NUPRC board include Engineer Paul Yaro Jezhi, a former chairman of the Trade Union Congress in Kaduna State, and Sunday Adebayo Babalola, a former deputy director at the defunct Department of Petroleum Resources. Both were nominated as non-executive commissioners.
President Tinubu also forwarded the names of several executive commissioners for the NUPRC board. They include Muhammed Sabo Lamido as executive commissioner for finance; Edu Inyang as executive commissioner for exploration and acreage; Justin Ezeala as executive commissioner for economic regulation and strategic planning; and Henry Darlington Oki as executive commissioner for development and production. Others are Indabawa Bashari Alka as executive commissioner for corporate services and administration; Mahmood Tijani as executive commissioner for health, safety and environment; and Olayemi Adeboyejo as secretary and legal adviser.
While Lamido and Adeboyejo were initially appointed by former President Muhammadu Buhari in 2022, Alka was appointed by President Tinubu in 2023. Inyang, Ezeala, Tijani, Babalola and Jezhi are new nominees of the current administration.
In a second letter to the Senate, President Tinubu nominated Adegbite Ebiowei Adeniji as chairman of the NMDPRA board. Adeniji, a lawyer with over three decades of experience in energy and natural resources, previously served as special technical adviser to the Minister of State for Petroleum on upstream and gas matters. He also worked with the World Bank’s Oil and Gas Policy team and is currently the managing partner of ENR Advisory.
Other nominees for the NMDPRA board include Chief Kenneth Kobani and Asabe Ahmed as non-executive members. Kobani is a former Minister of State for Trade and a former Secretary to the Government of Rivers State.
Also nominated for confirmation are Abiodun Adeniji as executive director of finance; Francis Ogaree as executive director of hydrocarbon; Oluwole Adama as executive director of midstream and downstream gas infrastructure; and Dr Mustapha Lamorde as executive director of corporate services and administration. Adama was appointed in 2024, while Lamorde, Adeniji and Ogaree were appointed between 2021 and 2022.
Additional nominees include Yahaya Nasamu Yinusa as executive director of distribution systems; Adeyemi Murtala Aminu as executive director of corporate services; Modie Ogechukwu as executive director of economic regulation and strategic planning; and Barrister Olawale Dawodu as board secretary and legal adviser. Dawodu is an industry professional and a former financial reporting manager at Exxon Nigerian subsidiaries.
President Tinubu urged the Senate to consider and approve the nominees expeditiously. The requests followed the recent confirmation of Oritsemeyiwa Eyesan as chief executive officer of the NUPRC and Engineer Saidu Aliyu Mohammed as chief executive officer of the NMDPRA. The President charged all appointees to discharge their duties professionally in regulating Nigeria’s oil and gas sector.