Governor Seriake Dickson of Bayelsa State 

‘The Atala oil field in Bayelsa state will open up Bayelsa state for more foreign investments’.

This was made known by the Governor of Bayelsa Seriake Dickson at the recently held Bayelsa State Investment and Economic Forum in Yenagoa.

Several investors have already indicated interest in the state owned marginal assets and promoters of some foreign companies met officials of the state government for possible partnership. Atala oil field is located on Oil Mining Lease (OML) 46, is one of the 24 Marginal fields allocated to 31 indigenous companies and state owned companies during the marginal fields licensing round in 2003.

Speaking at the forum, one of the promoters of foreign investors from Houston, Texas in United States told THISDAY that the meeting provided him the opportunity to study the successes recorded by the state government.

In his words “We are quite aware of the short period of turning around the fortune of Atala within two years of the take-over by Century Exploration and Production Limited through the initiative of Governor Dickson. Since the government has no business doing business, we are interested in replicating strategies adopted by Gov Dickson in other sectors in the State and Parts of Nigeria”

“As part of  Gov Dickson’s  plan for Bayelsa State, he put the state in the nation’s oil and gas map as the first and only state that brought to production its oil field-Atala field. This is one of the achievements recorded by the governor since his assumption of office on Feb 14, 2012,” he added.