The National Economic Council (NEC) chaired by Vice-President, Namadi Sambo, has moved to address the issue of oil theft in the country by setting up a committee headed by the Governor of Akwa Ibom state, Godswill Akpabio to arrest the anomaly that is estimated to cost the country $7billion annually.
Rising from its meeting in the Presidential Villa on Thursday, the council berated the loss of over 400,000 barrels per day production.
Briefing journalists on the outcome of the meeting, Delta state Governor, Emmanuel Uduaghan said the committee set up by NEC is set to meet with oil majors and the Joint Task Force (JTF) to work out modalities for the effective repair of the Nembe and Trans Niger pipelines which are currently shut down due to leakages.
State’s Foreign Loans
Chairman of NEC’s ad-hoc committee on the 2012/2013 federal/state governments borrowing plans, the Governor of Gombe state, Ibrahim Dankwabo, gave an update on efforts at facilitating and co-ordinating easy access to the international development funds cleared by National Assembly for interested states.
The council was also presented with a memorandum on how to address the issue of grazing reserves by the Governor of Adamawa state, Murtala Nyako, in which he underscored the need for the nation to pay more attention to food security as a means of boosting national production and the wellbeing of the people.
In presenting an update on the status of the Almajiri education programme, Minister of State for Education, Nyesom Wike, stated that 80 schools have already been built nationwide as part of the effort to address the problem of the high number of out of school children.
The council commended the progress recorded in the programme and recommended the take-off of academic programmes in the completed schools by the next academic calendar in September, 2013.