Atala Oil Well: Group Applauds Dickson For Fighting Licence Revocation

A socio-cultural group, Bayelsa West Congress, has commended the former governor of Bayelsa State and senator representing Bayelsa West, Senator Henry Seriake Dickson, for working relentlessly with Governor Douye Diri and other Bayelsa leaders to retrieve the state owned Atala oil field.

The group which hailed Dickson’s  doggedness and commitment in the struggle towards retrieving and restoring the state’s licence on the Atala Oil Field, OML 46, which was unjustly revoked by the defunct Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) in 2020 said,  it was Senator Dickson who called the minister of state for petroleum resources, Chief Timipre Sylva, on the telephone to enquire why an oil field belonging to  his home state was canceled.

“The minister told Senator Dickson that it was not just Atala OML but all non-producing oil fields owned by other governments. This was publicly stated in a statement by Senator Dickson,” it stated.

In a statement jointly signed by its chairman, Ebide Brown and spokesman, Moses Hitler respectively , it argued that Senator Dickson is not a businessman and has no personal interest in the Bayelsa Oil fields apart from the general interest of Bayelsa State.

While challenging the current administration to speak up and clarify issues, the group added that Senator Dickson upheld the interests of the state and the Ijaw nation during his administration  as governor and has continued to do so even as a senator.

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The group which condemned earlier statements made against the senator over the administration of the state’s oil wells, alleging that he has a stake in it, described the claims that he was working underground to revoke the licence of the Atala Marginal Fields (OML 46) as false and laughable.

While stating that the allegations were sponsored in a futile attempt to discredit the huge developmental projects which the senator executed in the state while he was governor, it said, “Senator Dickson does not own an oil licence and has never applied for an oil operating licence. Even if we want to assume he applied for an oil licence, is it his long time political rival Timipre Sylva that will grant him an oil licence?”

The group which further commended Dickson for his statesmanship, added that anyone with an interest in the oil wells would not have acted in that manner, but would have taken advantage of the situation.