The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, has said asking oil companies to relocate to the Niger Delta without addressing the security concerns will only escalate Nigeria’s cost of crude oil production.
Sylva said this in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, at a special town hall meeting organised by the state government and the Ministry of Petroleum Resources with chiefs, youths and other stakeholders in the state, according to a statement by the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board.
Sylva expressed the Federal Government’s commitment to the development of Bayelsa and other states of the Niger Delta.
Responding to calls for the relocation of oil companies to the Niger Delta region, the minister said youths and residents of the region must eschew restiveness and work for peace and security as preconditions for multinationals to relocate.
According to Sylva, it will make sense to the oil companies to return if the environment is safe because it will be cheaper for them.
