President Muhammadu Buhari is not predisposed to assenting to a bid round, for now, sources at the Nigerian Ministry of Petroleum have suggested, primarily as he has not said a word about the several lease sale proposals on his table, Africa Oil + Gas Report states.

Nigeria’s last bid round was in 2007, meaning that the Umar Yar’adua, and Goodluck Jonathan Presidencies did not conduct any lease sale, but the Goodluck Jonathan administration executed a number of discretionary marginal bid round awards, especially two (Ubima and Otakikpo) fields in the country’s east.

Between 40 and 50 marginal fields-undeveloped discoveries which have lain fallow in acreages operated by Shell, TOTAL ExxonMobil, Chevron and ENI for over 13 years-are expected to be up for grabs.

But President Muhammadu Buhari reportedly sees issues such as hydrocarbon lease sales as avenues where the elite tend to take advantage of the poor with some of the country’s most vocal economic analysts describing the president’s stance as inflexible.