Tinubu Nominates Magnus Abe as NUPRC Chairman, Seeks Senate Approval

President Bola Tinubu has nominated former Rivers South-East senator, Magnus Abe, as chairman of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), following the resignation of Gbenga Komolafe, and has forwarded the nomination to the Senate for confirmation.

The nomination was announced on Monday in a statement by the President’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, who said Tinubu had written to the Senate seeking approval for 21 nominees to the boards of the NUPRC and the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA).

“In the first letter, President Tinubu nominated Senator Magnus Abe to serve as the NUPRC board chair,” the statement said.

Abe, who served two terms representing Rivers South-East Senatorial District, is a former board member of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited and currently chairs the National Agency for the Great Green Wall.

Other nominees to the NUPRC board include Engineer Paul Yaro Jezhi, a former Trade Union Congress chairman in Kaduna State, and Mr Sunday Adebayo Babalola, a former deputy director at the defunct Department of Petroleum Resources, both named as non-executive commissioners.

The president also proposed several executive commissioners for the NUPRC board: Muhammed Sabo Lamido (finance), Edu Inyang (exploration and acreage), Justin Ezeala (economic regulation and strategic planning), Henry Darlington Oki (development and production), Indabawa Bashari Alka (corporate services and administration), and Mahmood Tijani (health, safety and environment). Ms Olayemi Adeboyejo was nominated as secretary and legal adviser.

In a separate letter, Tinubu nominated Adegbite Ebiowei Adeniji, a lawyer with more than 30 years’ experience in the energy sector, as chairman of the NMDPRA board. Adeniji previously served as a technical adviser to the minister of state for petroleum and worked with the World Bank on Nigeria’s oil and gas reforms.

The president urged the Senate to “approve the nominees expeditiously,” noting that the requests followed the recent appointment of chief executive officers for both regulatory bodies. He also charged all nominees to discharge their duties “professionally as regulators of the oil and gas sectors.”

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