Omotowa hands over NLNG key to Attah

At a farewell and welcome ceremony in Abuja, the NLNG key changed hands, as Babs Omotowa, former managing director/CEO, handed over the symbolic NLNG key to his successor, Tony Attah, marking the formal end and commencement of the tenures of Omotowa and Attah, respectively.

In his farewell remarks, Omotowa said: “NLNG is an inspiration and it is changing the narrative about Nigeria; same as Daewoo in South Korea, Mercedes in Germany, Toyota in Japan, etc. All hands must be together to protect this jewel.

“It has been an amazing five years that I have been privileged to occupy the position. I thank President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo for the leadership and support to NLNG. We met with the President last year and he gave us tremendous support. He was really concerned about the growth of the company.”

Receiving the NLNG key, Attah said the company was committed to the construction of Train 7, saying that with the instability in the industry, the company had no choice but to grow value and competitiveness in the global LNG market.

“Our reality today, is that as a business, we are again faced with significant challenge from within and without. Fuelled mainly by oversupply and underperforming global economies, international energy prices are once more travelling southwards. While domestically, the insecurity, which bedevilled our industry and others several years ago will appear to be unfortunately returning to the headlines,” Attah said.

On his predecessor, he said “anything other than success in Bab’s assignment five years ago would perhaps have meant that Nigeria would return to the top of the international gas flaring table. It would have meant that at NLNG, we would be wondering about who we are, corporate culture-wise. It would have meant that NNPC and other shareholders would have to look elsewhere for several billions of dollars in revenues over the years. It would have left Nigeria without approximately $6 billion in much needed taxes.”

Speaking on behalf of NLNG management and staff, Sadeeq Mai-Bornu, deputy managing director, assured the new managing director of support, saying, “The NLNG family welcome you with open arms, and are ready to give you all the support which enabled your predecessor to safely excel at his job.”

Omotowa left NLNG over the weekend to join the Shell Upstream International Leadership Team as vice president Safety and Environment (S&E) at The Hague, Netherlands.