Daily Independent Online.
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Monday, August 09, 2004.
Abuse of expatriate quota in oil industry
As apart of a 19-point deal reached at a
stakeholders meeting involving government, oil companies and organised labour
to avert a planned nationwide strike by oil workers, the Ministry of Internal
Affairs and the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) are to work out ways of
effective policing and implementation of the “under study” clause
in the expatriate quota approval, to forestall growing cases of abuse in the
nation’s oil and gas sector.
While we commend this lofty initiative, we enjoin the
DPR to step up monitoring because the abuse has been endemic over the years,
and the failure of expatriate personnel to place Nigerians in under-study
capacities has undermined the advancement of semi-skilled Nigerian workers and the objective of
technology transfer. It is appalling that over the years a number of these
foreign companies would take over even functions that Nigerians can
conveniently perform. Since 1963 when the Nigerian Immigration Service was
carved out of the Nigeria Police, expectations that expatriate quota regulations would be effectively
enforced have yet to be met. In consequence, foreigners have oftentimes been
deployed by companies to positions whose responsibilities could be efficiently
discharged by skilled Nigerians.
This remains a factor in the high unemployment situation in the country,
especially in regard to Nigerian graduates in Engineering and related technical
specialisms.
Government may, however, have to review aspects of
the aforesaid regulations in the light of the current drive for foreign
investments and the pursuit of full liberalisation. The authorities should look
for more forward-looking policies that would make foreign investments as
mutually beneficial (that is, to prospective investors and to the nation) as
possible.
It is important to note that a new trade and
investment philosophy has emerged as part of the New World Order. Countries
have several concessions they want from each other to hope for progress without
a single broad negotiation. The more horses there are to trade, the more
logical it becomes to trade them within the same market without prejudice.
Support around the globe is beginning to grow for such a concept. And we must
now nurture it if we are to brace up with countries like Indonesia, Malaysia
and Singapore.
This is the kind of certainty that will encourage
foreign investments in our country. It will also give solid backing to our
moves to open up our economy to the world. It will again help bolster our
economic reform agenda by opening incentives, introducing rules and creating a
more stable climate for our nationals to invest in the oil and gas industry as
well. It will amount to official hypocrisy and be counter- productive to
dictate to an expatriate entrepreneur who he should appoint to run what
managerial positions in his factory, in an era of deregulation and economic
liberalisation.
If the Nigerian government should have the political
will to invest in human capital and give Nigerians the needed education and training
necessary to change our environment, the need to understudy expatriates will
not arise as many Nigerians would definitely perform better than their foreign
counterparts. The exraordinary
accomplishments of thousands of Nigerian scientists, including Phillip
Emeagwali and Gabriel Oyibo, who have conquered their world and even surpassed
their white equals, readily come to mind.
Arguably, the average Nigerian is the quintessential
entrepreneur. Give him the right atmosphere uninhibited by a system that places
premium on unnecessary deference to potentates, and he comes across as a great
achiever. Add to this a dogged spirit of struggle and an uncommon determination
to succeed in spite of the odds. Despite the culture of philistinism enthroned
by our martial rulers who govern in eternal suspicion of anything cerebral,
Nigerians have excelled in the intellectual province both at home and abroad.
It is therefore not altogether desirable to insist
that Nigerians should continue to be in under-study positions even when it is
obvious that some of the so-called expatriates are less-heeled than their
Nigerian subordinates. However, this is not to say that the DPR should not be
granted the powers and proper funding to curtail the excesses of recalcitrant
oil companies operating in the country.
