By Adedapo Adesanya

The chief executive of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Mrs Oritsemeyiwa Eyesan, has lamented the decline in Nigeria’s technical and commercial talent pipeline.

She canvassed for the rebuilding of the critical talent needs as renewed investment returns to the country’s energy sector after years of underinvestment.

According to her, Nigeria is facing a depleted pool of geoscientists, petroleum engineers and other critical technical professionals, largely as a result of a drop in investments that saw many capable hands jump ship.

She emphasised that Nigeria’s annual oil and gas investment, which stood at about $24 billion in 2014, had fallen to roughly $2 billion by 2023, representing a decline of more than 90 per cent over the period.

Mrs Eyesan, therefore, warned that the country could face a new constraint if investment accelerates faster than the development of the technical workforce required to execute complex upstream projects.

She said the prolonged investment contraction did not only affect capital spending and exploration activity but also triggered a corresponding erosion of human capital, with geoscientists among the first professionals to leave the industry when companies began cutting budgets.

Mrs Eyesan made the remarks during a panel session on Local Content & Human Capital under PIA 2021 & NOGICD, held on the second day of the Oil and Gas Trainers Association of Nigeria (OGTAN) Human Capacity Development Conference and Expo at the Petroleum Training Institute, Effurun, Delta State.

According to her, petroleum engineers were subsequently affected as the downturn deepened, with some made redundant while others were increasingly restricted to maintenance functions as operators moved from expansion to survival.

The official said the industry is now moving in the positive direction, with renewed investment and project development creating an urgent requirement for a new generation of highly specialised professionals.

The shift on her part is particularly significant following President Bola Tinubu’s Deep Offshore Oil and Gas Projects Incentives (Tax Remission) Order, 2026, signed on August 6, providing production tax credits for qualifying deep offshore project developments and is designed to improve the economics of projects reaching Final Investment Decision (FID) within the specified window.

Mrs Eyesan therefore warned that the country could face a new constraint if investment accelerates faster than the development of the technical workforce required to execute complex upstream projects.

The NUPRC boss had previously identified the skills deficit as a major consequence of the prolonged reduction in exploration activity, particularly affecting geologists.

She said renewed investment following the Petroleum Industry Act and business-oriented initiatives of the Tinubu administration was beginning to revive exploration, but warned that human capacity remained a major challenge.

Mrs Eyesan said Nigeria could no longer prepare oil and gas professionals using curricula designed primarily for an earlier generation of petroleum operations.

She identified digitised operations, advanced geoscience, digital twins and digital drilling technologies among the competencies that should now form part of the industry’s core workforce development strategy.

She disclosed that the transformation is significant because modern upstream projects increasingly depend on the ability to integrate subsurface data, real-time field information, automation, modelling and advanced analytics into investment and operational decisions.

For Nigeria, she said, the implication is that training institutions, operators, regulators and academia must move beyond simply replacing workers lost during the downturn.

They must build a workforce capable of operating the digital oilfield of the next investment cycle.

She said, “Training curricula need to evolve,” cautioning that Nigeria was still behind where it needed to be in developing the competencies required by a rapidly changing industry.

Mrs Eyesan also linked human capital development directly to Nigeria’s competitiveness for investment.

Using the analogy that capital behaves like water and flows towards areas of least resistance, she argued that Nigeria’s workforce must become more commercially oriented if the country is to capture greater value from the next wave of oil and gas investment.

She further explained that technical professionals increasingly need to understand the commercial consequences of their decisions, while commercial professionals need sufficient technical understanding to operate effectively within increasingly complex energy projects.

Mrs Eyesan further called for a fundamental change in how Nigeria approaches human capacity development, urging operators, regulators and training institutions to work more closely with universities and other academic institutions to establish a clear pathway for closing the existing skills gap.

By Modupe Gbadeyanka

The chairman of United Bank for Africa (UBA), Mr Tony Elumelu, expressed his displeasure over the way he was addressed by one of the company’s graduate trainees at an interactive session in a viral video.

The financial institution organised a Graduate Management Accelerated Programme graduation ceremony on Thursday, and the former banker was in attendance.

During a question-and-answer session, one of the graduating trainees stood and called Mr Elumelu by his first name, Tony.

“Good morning, Tony,” she said.

Mr Elumelu initially thought the lady meant to say Toyin, but she repeated “Good morning, Tony,” a development the UBA chairman was not happy about.

He quickly responded by saying, “No, you won’t call me Tony. You’ll call me Mr Elumelu or TOE. You won’t call me Tony, or Chairman. I don’t subscribe to that kind of… Oyinbo life, okay?”

Though without offering any apology for the error, the female graduate trainee subsequently corrected herself, saying, “Good morning, Mr Elumelu,” before proceeding with her question.

The video clip from the event has already generated mixed reactions, with many happy that the business mogul quickly rebuffed the lady.

They described her as rude, fearing she could lose her job for being disrespectful to the chairman of the organisation.

However, some others said calling colleagues by their first names in a corporate ecosystem is not new, as such happens in the banking sector.

By Modupe Gbadeyanka

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has promised to return the payment of subsidies for premium motor spirit (PMS), otherwise known as petrol, if he is elected President in 2027.

Mr Atiku is seeking to become Nigeria’s President next year. He is contesting for the position under the African Democratic Congress (ADC). The presidential election is slated for January 16, 2027.

Answering questions in a trending interview on social media, the former second citizen of the country said the removal of the fuel subsidy by President Bola Tinubu in 2023 has not done Nigerians any good.

According to him, the economy has been in shambles, noting that the subsidy removal is responsible for high living costs in Nigeria.

On Wednesday, the Minister of Finance, Mr Taiwo Oyedele, disclosed that the nation saved about N15.8 trillion between June 2023 and December 2025 from the policy, noting that over N10 trillion was made available to the 36 state governments and the 774 local government areas from the savings.

But the ADC presidential candidate was not impressed with this explanation, stressing that there is nothing to show for the purported gains of the policy.

“I initially did not oppose the removal of the fuel subsidy. But now that it has been removed, where is the money? Where has the subsidy money gone? Has it been used to improve healthcare, education or security?” he queried.

“If I win the presidential election, I will restore the subsidy. And anyone who stole Nigeria’s subsidy funds must return the money,” he declared.