Buhari President to meet with Niger Delta stakeholders on November 1 This was disclosed by Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu on Thursday, October 27, in Abuja.

President Muhammadu Buhari
(Getty)

President Muhammadu Buhari is set to meet with major stakeholders from the Niger Delta on Tuesday, November 1.

This was disclosed by Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu on Thursday, October 27, in Abuja.

“On Tuesday, the President will be meeting with the Niger Delta stakeholders of the oil-producing areas. It is important that we continue to sustain the institutional engagement and negotiations that are key to do this work,” Kachikwu said.

“Our target is to have an incident reduction by 90 per cent by 2018 and to target zero militancy and shut down by middle of 2017. Whatever shutdown experienced by the middle of next year, we expect it to be production slippages and not militancy issues. We must resolve current militancy problems and bring back production to 2.2 million barrels per day. We are currently at 1.8 million.

“We will like to begin the year once Exxon Mobil brings back its production this week with 2.2 million barrels per day. But the reality is that 2.2 million barrels does not represent the capacity of this nation.

“We have the capacity to increase to three million barrels per day, the problem has been funding. We are working with the oil sector players to find solutions to our cash call problems,” he added.

ALSO READ: President seeks National Assembly’s approval to get $30B loan

Buhari had earlier said that the oil and gas sector is still key in solving the current economic crisis.