The beneficiary of the $9.6bn judgment of a United Kingdom court, Process & Industrial Process, has said its Gas Supply and Processing Agreement with Nigerian would have generated 2000 megawatts had the country not reneged on its part of the deal.
The Irish firm said this in a mail on Thursday in response to an enquiry by PUNCH.
P&ID stated that only 59 per cent of the country had access to reliable supply of electricity, citing World Bank’s report.
It added that if the project had been executed, there could have been “transformative for millions of Nigerians”.
It stated, “Lastly, we mustn’t forget the entire reason for the P&ID contract in the first place.
“It was to take waste gas that was (and still is) being flared into the atmosphere – which is extremely detrimental to the environment and to public health – and process this into feedstock gas for the national grid at no cost to the Nigerian government.
“The P&ID project would have generated up to 2,000 megawatts of power.
“Such a major increase in the electricity supply brought by the P&ID project could have been transformative for millions of Nigerians.
“At present, the World Bank estimates that only 59 per cent of the country have access to reliable supply of electricity.
“The failure of the government to supply the gas is a tragedy for all of those who could have benefitted from the project – and a tragedy for the environment.
“All of this raises serious concerns for foreign investors in Nigeria, whether you are investing in a commercial enterprise or considering buying the next tranche of Eurobonds.
“Not only will Nigeria deliberately refuse to pay an international arbitration award backed by an English court, but they are prepared to launch sham investigations and character assassinations in an attempt to bully investors into giving up their legal rights.”
The firm insisted that Nigeria had the opportunity to settle its liability in the failed contract with only $850m in 2015 before the arbitral award of $9.6bn by the arbitration panel in 2017 but government failed to take advantage of it.
It stated, “In May 2015, prior to the award on liability, P&ID offered to settle for $850m.
“In June 2015, the Buhari administration took power, but did not take P&ID up on their offer.”
The firm also accused the Buhari administration, particularly the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, and his Information and Culture counterpart, Lai Mohammed, of dithering over their earlier proposal of settlement talks.
“As P&ID has stated before, the ball is in Nigeria’s court. If the Nigerian government is serious about a willingness to negotiate – they need to do so in good faith.”
