But Organization of Oil Producing Nations recently cut down the production quotas of her member state thus forcing crude oil prize to skyrocket.
But the bombing of crude oil facilities in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria means that the impacts of this upward swing in the asking price of crude oil internationally wouldn’t be felt in Nigeria except something fast is done to resolve these renewed hostilities.
This is where the incoming top US diplomat is expected to mediate a lasting truce.
The Muhammadu Buhari’s administration is said to have invested billions of Nigerian cash in searching for Crude oil resources in the Chad basin and much of Northern Nigeria even as the government is building pipelines from Niger Republic to Kaduna refinery to pump in crude oil for refining since the dominant Crude oil producing areas of the South is said to be beyond reach due to heightened activities of oil militants.
Buhari has to the consternation of the US government deployed armed soldiers to wage battles against the armed militants bombing oil pipelines. The US government favours peace talk.
The incoming Secretary of state as a renowned Crude oil dealer would work for peace and not war in the Niger Delta region hopefully.
The West including the American based Crude oil companies such as Exon Mobil have substantial stakes in the onshore and offshore sectors of the Nigerian oil crude industry so the choice of this Crude oil baron is significant and would impact negatively or positively on Nigeria.
Most Nigerians are optimistic that the coming of the ExxonMobil executive as top diplomat of America under Donald Trump will be positively remarkable for us. There’s a reason for this wave of optimism.
Firstly, the major demands of the Niger Delta militants are for fairness and justice in the ownership structure of the Crude oil wells located in their backyards which are largely controlled by politicians and ex-military Generals from Northern Nigeria who exploited their proximity to past military despots in Nigeria to gain control over crude oil wells located deep inside of Niger Delta region.
If the new Secretary of State is not as divisive as the outgoing Secretary of State Mr. John Kerry, then the crisis in the Niger Delta could speedily be resolved so production could pick up and the environmental rights of the people of Niger Delta restored.
America may also resume big time purchase of Nigeria crude oil which Barack Obama significantly cut down with the discovery of other sources of crude oil production within the United States of America.
But these new methods of drilling crude oil is said to be harmful on the long run to the environment of the Americas.
Apart from the cut in the purchasing volumes of crude oil from Nigeria the outgoing US administration has terrible image within Nigeria.
John Kerry since the last one year has played divide-and-rule politics within Nigeria by visiting and befriending only Northern governors to the chagrin of Southerners who felt betrayed.
In one of the Chapters of his phenomenal book titled: “Crude Continents: The Struggle for Africa’s Oil Prize”, the British Journalist observed as follows regarding Nigeria:
“Nigeria, including its onshore, offshore and deep-water discoveries, is a key destination for exploration and development funds”.
“All the super-majors and many state companies are positioned there, as are many independents (and a growing herd of Nigerian oil players). As in the recent past, its future floats on oil and gas.”
“The beneficence of oil has brought not stability but contested legitimacy. Power struggles have marked the past 50 years.
“They have been unremitting and at times violent, as within the Niger Delta over the past decade, even as the political landscapes have altered over time.
“Does fragmentation and further conflict await Africa’s most populous state in coming decades? The answer will be critical to Nigeria, corporate oil, the Gulf of Guinea and Africa”.
The writer also observed: “The struggle over oil is not new.
“Although the situation in Nigeria improved after the abortive Biafran war of secession (a conflict over politics, ethnicity and oil), serious turmoil resurfaced in 1993.
“Political and economic stability remain fragile and could deteriorate further as a result of a variety of coalescing conditions: onshore conflicts, threats to the offshore, social conflict with corporate oil, ethnic divisions, Muslim/Christian divides, Sharia law in northern states, demands on the federal government for decentralization, southern discontent, irredentist pressures in Delta States that want greater control over oil, internal politics shaped by elites and military, political turmoil over democracy, economic disparities, and so on”.
“Oil and issues of ethnic balance, with past military involvement in the top echelons of politics, have been the main drivers in the Nigerian landscape.”
These recorded evidential realities are some of the dynamics that the new American Secretary of state is expected to navigate so Nigeria can derive maximum benefits from our diplomatic deals with the World’s richest democracy.
Emmanuel Onwubiko is the intellectual head of Human rights writers Association of Nigeria and blogs @ www.emmanuelonwubiko.com