Fresh facts have emerged as to the underlying reasons the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, was removed as the Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation(NNPC), after serving in that capacity for a period of 11 months.
Before his appointment as GMD of NNPC last August, he was the Executive Vice Chairman and General Counsel for Exxon Mobil (Africa).
Armed with private sector experience, Kachikwu, on assumption of office, introduced some swift reforms geared towards the restructuring of the NNPC, the resuscitation of the refineries, and deregulation of the downstream sector of the petroleum industry.
He also sought to introduce transparency and accountability in the huge oil corporation in such a way that each subsidiary would be required to render profit and loss accounts at the end of each fiscal year.
There have been speculations that Kachikwu came under attacks from various quarters and interest groups who felt threatened by these reforms.
Telegraph learnt that Kachikwu had to give way because, apart from the abnormality in one person holding the two strategic positions, he was too fast and reform-minded for the NNPC and ruffled not a few feathers while he held sway as the NNPC boss.
An oil industry source told Telegraph that the first factor that led to his exit was that it was not legal for one person to be the Minister of Petroleum Resources and Group Managing Director of NNPC, at the same time.
“It was an anomaly and supposed to be a temporary arrangement. It was not supposed have lasted that long. In addition, he brought private sector initiatives into a largely conservative and bureaucratic system. Normally, reforms will be resisted by those used to the old system.
But one of the things he didn’t do well was not carrying the people along. “There was a lot of disenchantment in the system because of the sweeping reforms Kachikwu tried to introduce.
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