The National Petroleum Investment Management Services (NAPIMS), a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation NNPC, has said it is satisfied with the quality of job being done on the $3.8bn Egina Integration project currently going on at the Lagos Deep Offshore Logistics Base LADOL.
The project also called the Egina Floating Production Storage and Offload (FPSO) Integration Platform, believed to be first of its kind in the entire West African sub-region, is being done under the management of Samsung Heavy Industries SHI, with LADOL as its local content partner. Two General Managers of NAPIMS, Jock James and Kanayo Odoe, who led the top management of the company on an inspection of the LADOL facility in Apapa, Lagos said that the quality of job at the site meets global standards.
The duo, who fielded questions from newsmen shortly after the inspection, also heard that the company had always supported the siting of the Egina project at the LADOL yard.
According to them, today, NAPIMS has been justified because the oil and gas logistics service provider has adequately demonstrated its competence in handling of the project, which has already gulped over $450 million in terms of local content inputs from LADOL.
“We are quite delighted that NAPIMS’ support for the integration of the fabrication platform at LADOL Base has been justified by the quality of work currently going on at the base”, James, who is GM, Production Sharing Contract PSC of NAPIMS said.
He also insisted that the fact that promoters of LADOL have adequately demonstrated their ability to undertake the strategic project through their due diligence, informed why NAPIMS stood its ground that Samsung should not take it outside the country.
“It was a battle well fought and what we are seeing today is a reality and a testimony of the fact that we were right in our supports considering the quality of work being done here, not to mention the fact that a large number of Nigerians are engaged here to acquire trainings and skills”, he also said.
He disclosed that when the NAPIMS’ team first visited LADOL some years ago, the site which has now been transformed into a world-class facility was a virgin swamp and all they could say then was, ‘if you agree with Samsung, this is where the fabrication yard will be sited’.
James, who also commended LADOL, however pledged that NAPIMS has a mandate not only to support the indigenous organisations, but also to encourage them and other similar organisations that have demonstrated “the can-do spirit” that is needed for the nation’s economic growth and development.
Meanwhile, Odoe who is General Manager of the Nigerian Petroleum Exchange NIPEX, which is an arm of NAPIMS, said that the success of the Egina FPSO project so far will open doors for more of similar jobs in Nigeria.
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