NNPC [now NNPC Ltd] Headquarters
My birthday is July 26, and for this year of 2022, it falls on Tuesday this week – next tomorrow precisely. And you know what? This year birthday comes as landmark or hallmark for reason l preferred you to guess out – without The Guru’s helping anyone out.
It is for the reason of its conspicuousness that I have chosen to celebrate it differently from how it would have been celebrated – or how my family and admirers would have wanted it to go. And my choice is based on the fantastic thought and honour l have always attached to Mondays; when your golden-like program – Adu & The Guru, comes up on air, to celebrate tomorrow with the topic The Guru’s birthday Colloquium.
I therefore admonish all, across the globe to tune in tomorrow: tune in and leaving the dial permanently at Lagos Talks 91.3 FM, from 0930 t0 1100 hours, to follow the glamour and glory of the Colloquium, and none will ever regret doing so.
Oloibiri Oilfield, in present day Bayelsa State; South/South geopolitical zone of Nigeria, was discovered on Sunday, January 15, 1956, by Shell Darcy. It was the first commercial oil discovery in Nigeria; this discovery ended 50 years of unsuccessful oil exploration in the country world.
By implication, it has been argued that the January 15, 1956, discovery marked Nigeria’s first movement of Crude from the country to international Oil market.
This claim; which most Nigerians believed hook, line, and sinker is a great fallacy of presentation as the British had embarked on taking our Crude away surreptitiously for years before 1956. Let us step down interrogation of this claim, as maybe, one of the discussants tomorrow may touch on the subject matter.
We can, for the purpose of energizing this discussion, take one step backwards along memory lane of history, as that will teach us the company in charge of Oil in Nigeria before the discovery of the Product in 1956, and even before the establishment of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), on April 1, 1977, by Decree 33 of that year.
Back to 1936, The Royal Dutch/Shell Group founded Shell D’Arcy, the first Shell Company in Nigeria. The parent company of the Shell group is Royal Dutch Shell plc, which is incorporated in England and Wales. Royal Dutch Shell was formed in April 23, 1907, to a small shop in London where the Samuel family sold sea shells, through the merger of Royal Dutch Petroleum Company of the Netherlands and The “Shell” Transport and Trading Company of the United Kingdom.
The “Shell” Transport and Trading Company (the quotation marks were part of the legal name) was a British company, founded in 1897 by Marcus Samuel, 1st Viscount Bearsted and his brother Samuel Samuel.
We now have at our disposal where it all started from – it means we can therefore navigate with ease this voyage of discovery.
It was first Royal Dutch Shell, then Shell D’Arcy, before Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation [NNPC] and now; in the Year of our Lord Jesus Christ – 2022, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited.
Above is the trajectory of this country’s movement across many points before arriving where we are today – with many questions begging for answers. They are all naughty questions anyway. They are tough questions that only the art of digging down deep can bring factual answers.
And this is a scarce commodity [facts] in a country that has adopted fallacies as a way of life. We have lived long enough with lies that we don’t even know anything closer to truth anymore.
I still recollect vividly that the late National Democratic Coalition [NADECO] leader – Pa Abraham Adesanya of blessed memory; once challenged another political leader from the North/West geopolitical zone of the country – a leader that was once a governor, to authenticate the last affidavit of age he swore which made his first son 6 years his senior. This is the type of life’s falsification that most Nigerians have attained.
It is therefore a very cumbersome assignment that The Guru has set for those discussants that shall be tackling the subject of the Colloquium tomorrow.
The topic is: When and how Oil boom turned to doom for Nigerians.
The Guru has the discretion of keeping the names of the discussants to his chest intact until tomorrow and this is what he has chosen to do.
Let us meet at the Arena of Lagos Talks 91.3 FM, to access facts behind the façade of how much trillions of Dollars Nigerians have been scammed of, by our Dealers parading themselves as Leaders.
Just a little efforts of The Guru in seeing of what is left to be salvaged from a Ship about to sink!
Godwin Etakibuebu; a veteran Journalist, wrote from Lagos.
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You can also listen to this author [Godwin Etakibuebu] every Monday; 9:30 – 11am on Lagos Talk 91.3 FM live, in a weekly review of topical issues, presented by The News Guru [TNG].