The Director, Petroleum Resources (DPR) and President of the Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE), Mr. George Osahon, has said only the DPR can determine the volume of crude oil lost to thieves and vandalism in Nigeria. Osahon told THISDAY that the current situation where each of the stakeholders in Nigeria's oil and gas industry gave out conflicting figures of the volume of crude oil stolen should not have arisen, as the DPR was the only authority that should tell the government how much crude was stolen.
"But unfortunately, the industry has a lot of issues. Each company or stakeholder wants to look good. One ministry will announce that some barrels of crude oil are lost; operating company will give a different figure of number of barrels of oil that is stolen. My feeling is that the DPR should take care of it. If they (DPR) do not know, then they should be called to question. It is only the DPR that should be able to tell us how much oil that is lost and whether the loss is due to theft or not," he explained. Osahon noted that some of the oil companies had flow stations where all the gas and water are knocked off and stabilised crude oil taken through the pipelines to the export terminals.
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