After wasting billions of Naira on a failed electronic management system, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) abandoned the project after it was discovered that corrupt officials cashed in to siphon and line their pockets.
But, barely a year after it was left in the cooler, Group Managing Director of the corporation, Maikanti Baru, announced on Monday the project was poised to be reinstated to ensure operations of the national oil company were digitalized, "within the shortest possible time".
To realise that objective, Mr. Baru announced last week in Abuja the inauguration of two committees, namely the Systems Applications and Products (SAP) Steering Committee (SC) and Group Process Council (GPC).
He said the committees would be responsible for "a holistic implementation of SAP and emplace enterprise resource planning which would serve as enablers for the achievement of the corporation's success."
Besides, he said, a "paperless going concern represents a work environment wherein the use of paper is eliminated or greatly reduced".
This, he explained, is usually achievable through conversion of documents and other papers into digital form.
Mr. Baru said SAP was the platform for driving the transformation agenda of the NNPC and the 12 Business Focus Areas (BUFA) which include: Ensuring Security of the Industry assets; Developing New Business Models, Providing viable alternative funding to JV Cash Calls, Increasing the nation's Production & Reserves base and Growing NPDC oil and gas production.
Others include: Effecting Refinery Upgrade & Expansion, Embarking on Renewable Energy Drive & Frontier Exploration, Rehabilitating the nation's Oil & Gas Infrastructure, Strengthening NNPC Ventures & Common Services, Enhancing Staff Professionalism & Accountability as well as their Welfare.
The NNPC GMD said the SAP platform had the potential to significantly influence the corporation's ability to compete, operate effectively and create value.
"We have commissioned a new re-delivery project to address the existing SAP challenges we are facing. We are implementing new solutions to manage some of our existing processes not currently on SAP," Mr. Baru said.
He said the system would also enable the corporation obtain value from its investments in SAP and provide a working environment where its strategic focus areas were managed in an efficient and effective manner.
Mr. Baru said the project committees would oversee the overall success and provide oversight on management of project issues and risks, as well as approve strategic decisions on SAP.
"Such committee decisions must align with the strategic objectives of NNPC, and most importantly, act as SAP ambassadors across the NNPC group to ensure business commitment and ownership of processes deployed on the platform," he said.
Besides, the NNPC GMD said the Group Process Council would be accountable for ensuring the processes were optimised and end-to-end assessment of processes were carried out before implementation on SAP.
He charged members of the committees to firmly establish SAP as the single source for the corporation's business transactions, stressing as leaders at various levels, they should take ownership of the process areas, and drive User Adoption of SAP Solutions in those process areas.
"Let us all be change agents in this journey, drive user adoption, and also see ourselves as leaders committed to setting the right tone for SAP in order to embed excellence and transparency in our operations," Mr. Baru said.
Earlier, the Chief Operating Officer, Corporate Services, Isah Inuwa, said the NNPC SAP journey had been very eventful with the rollout of finance and materials management processes on SAP solutions since 2007.
"To that effect, we have commenced re-implementation of some SAP solutions that experienced challenges in delivering their value proposition, such as Crude Oil and Gas Allocation, enhanced Purchase to Pay (P2P), Business Intelligence and SAP solutions deployed in some SBUs," Mr. Inuwa posited.
He noted that the inauguration marked a significant milestone in the NNPC SAP journey as it would usher in improved Purchase to Pay (P2P), Hire to Retire (H2R), Order to Cash (O2C), and Record to Report (R2R) processes, which will further strengthen SAP as the single source of truth for NNPC.
The Group General Manager, Information Technology Division (ITD), Danladi Inuwa, said the inauguration of the two committees would provide support for the new NNPC business model, and would lead to the holistic implementation of new solutions to manage some of the NNPC's existing processes not currently on SAP.
Members of the two committees were drawn from all the Seven Autonomous Business Units and all the Strategic Business Units of the NNPC.
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