Nigeria asks ONGC, Mittal Energy to honour $6bn commitment

Nigeria has asked the Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) and steel billionaire Lakshmi N Mittal combine to fulfil its USD 6-billion

commitment of investing in infrastructure of the African nation as part of the deal by which the duo was awarded an oil block in November 2006.

"They must live by the commitments they made in the agreement," said Emmanuel O Egbogah, Special Adviser to the Nigerian President, said on the sidelines of Petrotech 2009 conference here.

ONGC Mittal Energy, the joint venture company floated by ONGC and Mittal Investment Sarl, had promised to invest USD 6 billion in building a 1,80,000 barrel per day refinery, a 2,000 MW power plant and a railway line connecting eastern and western Nigeria.

"They had signed an agreement committing those investments but nothing has happened so far," he said. With investments not flowing, the Nigerian Parliament ordered an inquiry to probe alleged irregularities in the allotment.

"We have no problems whatsoever with ONGC but Mittals have a lot to come clean on," he said. He, however, stated the problem will be resolved soon. "We will be able to resolve the issue soon."

OMEL had in November 2006 paid USD 100 million to win the OPL-246 block. The Nigerian Government had vested the block from local company South Atlantic Petroleum (Sapetro) before allocating it to OMEL.

An ad-hoc committee of the House of Representatives has been formed to investigate into the alleged irregularities in allotment of oil blocks between 2006 and 2008. This, after original applications for OPL 216 and 246 could not be traced in the files