The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and Bayero University Kano (BUK) have pledged to partner in the ongoing exploratory activities in the frontier basins across the country.
The Group Managing Director of NNPC, Dr. Maikanti Baru, made this known Thursday when the Vice Chancellor of BUK, Prof. Muhammad Yahuza Bello, paid him a visit at the Corporation’s headquarters in Abuja.
Baru said the Corporation would always identify with the Ivory Towers because its work force was drawn from the universities, according to the Group General Manager, Public Affairs Division, Ndu Ughamadu.
“Your visit would open up opportunities for collaboration between NNPC and your university and we are looking forward to receiving your inputs”, Baru stated.
Ughamadu quoted Baru as saying that while the Corporation was not keen on setting up a university, it had nonetheless established the NNPC Learning Academy which trains high level manpower for the Oil and Gas Industry. He added that it offered short term high level technical courses capable of enhancing the oil industry operations.
Petronas has been supportive
Baru said NNPC already had an established relationship with Petronas on shipping, saying further collaborations with the company are underway.
Earlier, BUK Vice Chancellor, Professor Bello, said the university was in collaboration with Petronas, as he called on other industry stakeholders to join the NNPC by showing interest in education.
Bello noted that Petronas had awarded Ph.D scholarship to 13 staff members of BUK in different areas of Civil Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Petroleum Engineering, among others in recent times.
“Bayero University Kano has being given permission by the National University Commission (NUC) to commence degree programmes in Petroleum Engineering and Chemical Engineering. The students are in their fourth year now and we believe that it would be a good idea for us to establish a relationship with NNPC in a number of areas, in particular, we want to appeal to NNPC to support BUK in implementing the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) we signed with Petronas’ University of Technology,” Bello added.
