keeping with its goal of developing Nigerian Content in the oil and gas sector, General Electric Nigeria has pledged to create 2,300 jobs through its operations in the next five years.
The company’s Nigerian Content Manager, Mr. Sunny Ojieh disclosed this on Wednesday when senior personnel of the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB) visited the firm’s base in Onne, Rivers State as part of their role of monitoring and assessing capacities in the industry.
According to him, General Electric Nigeria presently had 502 Nigerians in its employ, with a good percentage of them holding executive positions. He noted that GE was implementing a programme that fast tracks Nigerians into global positions and 31 Nigerians had graduated through the programme since 2012.
Speaking further, Ojieh explained that the company’s operations were anchored on localizing operations, building capacity, developing and leveraging on the local supply chain.
He added that GE also focused on creating long-term job opportunities and empowering indigenes of host communities with skills relevant to the company’s operations
Throwing further insight, the Nigerian Content Manager disclosed that General Electric had spent over $320m on in-country projects since 2010 and had committed to invest additional $1bn in the Calabar assembly and manufacturing facility over the next five years.
The plan according to him was to domicile most of the company’s operations in Nigeria, adding that GE Nigeria was also injecting $3m into community health programme as part of its corporate social responsibility obligations.
The site visit also featured interactions with the company’s Manufacturing Manager, Mr. Felix Anikpo, who disclosed that $6m was invested to develop GE’s shop floor at Onne where products like specialty connectors, pipes, mud mats and wellheads were being manufactured.
While appealing to the Board to help in ensuring that the capacity of the facility was fully utilised, he disclosed that the company had recently worked for SNEPCO and Exxon Mobil.
In his speech, the Executive Secretary of the NCDMB, Mr. Denzil Kentebe assured General Electric that the Board would continue to partner with serious indigenous and foreign investors towards attracting industry projects to their facilities so as to justify their investments and encourage capacity building in the oil and gas industry.
Kentebe who was represented by the Manager Capacity Building, Engr. Godwin Ukobo also commended the company on the Project Emerald training facility which is billed to open in 2018.
