The EITI Regional Director, Mr. Pablo Valverde, has stated that the EITI validation is more of peer learning exercise than punitive.
The global Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) validation process is a quality assurance mechanism to ascertain the level of compliance to EITI standard in the oil, gas and mining sectors among member countries, including Nigeria.
The EITI team were recently in Nigeria to gather data as the country underwent second Validation. Speaking at a Stakeholders’ Workshop on Validation in Abuja organized by the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), Mr. Valverde said the exercise for Nigeria or any other member country, was not pass or fail examination, neither is it punitive.
He explained that the exercise is a way of providing consistent assessment of progress against specific EITI requirements. The exercise, he added, is to help countries that seek to improve their oil, gas and mining sectors operations.
In July 2016, Nigeria underwent validation under the 2016 EITI Standard. Based on the validation report, the EITI Board ranked Nigeria in the “Meaningful Progress” category and identified specific issues which Nigeria through NEITI needs to address in the assessment that had recently been concluded.
Participants at the workshop included members of parliament, government agencies, civil society organizations (CSOs), media, development partners, and representatives of extractive companies.
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