The Federal Government, through the Federal Executive Council (FEC), has awarded the Phase-1 Engineering, Procurement & Construction contract for the Oloibiri Museum & Research Centre (OMRC) in Bayelsa State to Julius Berger Nigeria Plc.
The completion period for the project is set at 30 months.
The FEC meeting, which was chaired by President Muhammadu Buhari, also approved the scope of work, which will include the construction of a museum and a research center.
The OMRC has been in the concept stage for over three decades, and its establishment is seen as a crucial step in the nation’s quest for home-grown technology inputs in the oil and gas industry.
The project is being carried out in partnership with the Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF), Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB), Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC), and the Bayelsa State Government (BYSG). Each entity will contribute to the development of the OMRC in the ratio of 40, 30, 20, and 10 per cent, respectively.
The project is aimed at converting the location of the first oil discovery in Nigeria into a monument that preserves the heritage and developments in the oil and gas sector.
The OMRC project is expected to have a significant impact on employment, tourism, research and technology development, and the integration of oil and gas host communities into the mainstream developmental narrative of the country.
“The project consists of the construction of a Museum where historic developments, data, equipment, and tools used in the Nigerian oil and gas industry will be stored for posterity and the construction of a functional Research Center where prototypes can be tested and validated,” said the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Chief Timipre Sylva.
He went on to explain that the project has adopted a development model that leverages the benefits of public-private partnerships, inter-agency collaboration, and inter-governmental alignment to optimize resource utilization and ensure that the Oloibiri museum meets international standards.
The groundbreaking ceremony for the OMRC project is expected to take place in the first quarter of 2023.
The ceremony will mark the beginning of an upliftment in the quality of life for the people of the Niger Delta and Bayelsa State.
