The Nigerian Senate will begin consideration of the Petroleum Industry Bill on October 20, according to Ahmad Lawan, the Senate President.
The bill which has been in the works for a number of years was recently transmitted to the National Assembly by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Speaking on Thursday, Lawan said early consideration of the bill would ensure it is not delayed by the budget defence of ministries and agencies, which is expected to drag on for a whole month.
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He said, “For the PIB, we need to get the document to our Joint Committee before we suspend plenary, otherwise, the document will remain unattended to throughout the time that we would be handling the budget; and that means we can only come back to it around November or December, and that would be late.
“Everybody is waiting for the PIB to be attended to, but we will take sufficient time to work on it because it is a very sensitive document.”
The Senate President said, “Nevertheless, we should take the debate and Second Reading of the PIB by the upper week, Tuesday 20th, 2020, and refer the document to our Joint Committees on Petroleum (Upstream and Downstream); and Gas.
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“So, while we are working on the budget, they can keep work on the PIB warm. We are not going to rush on it since we have the budget before us.”
