The Nigerian National
Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has said it "may well be on the verge of a
significant oil find" in the Lake Chad area, which has been blighted by
Boko Haram-related violence. "There are signs from the latest 3D seismic
studies that oil may well be very close to being found now in Lake Chad after
very many years of trials," added group managing director Ibe Kachikwu.
Kachikwu,
appointed in August to overhaul the state-run group, described the potential
find as "very key" and indicated it would help access to crude in northern
Nigeria.
AFP report continues:
"I
am optimistic that by the end of the year we should be able to announce
something major on this," he was quoted as saying in an emailed statement
on Sunday evening.
Kachikwu
gave no further details but it is understood he was referring to the Kukawa
area of Borno state, where exploration had previously begun but was halted
because of the six-year Islamist insurgency.
An
NNPC source said exploration had resumed.
In
2006, Nigeria handed licences to the state-run China National Petroleum
Corporation to explore four blocks in the Lake Chad basin.
Lake
Chad forms the border between Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon. Chad hit oil
on its side of the border in the late 1970s. Production hit 100,000 barrels a
day in 2013.
Nigeria's
military has claimed a series of successes in pushing the militants out of
captured towns and villages in the remote region, and has claimed rebel camps
have been destroyed.
The
discovery of oil has the potential to transform the Muslim-majority north,
where poverty and unemployment have been seen as key factors in radicalization.
There
have been estimates that 100 billion cubic metres of oil deposits lie beneath
Lake Chad and its arid hinterland in Nigeria.
Boko
Haram wants to carve out a hardline Islamic state in northeast Nigeria but
there have been no serious suggestions that its insurgency is driven by oil.
Instead, the militants' aim
is primarily ideological and religious.
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