The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited has welcomed public scrutiny of its operations, while defending the performance of its Group Chief Executive Officer, Bayo Ojulari, citing increased crude oil production under his leadership.

The clarification followed recent reports attributed to the Oil and Gas Professionals Forum, which questioned the company's leadership over the recently concluded oil licensing round conducted by the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission.

NNPC's Chief Corporate Communications Officer, Andy Odeh, said the company remained committed to transparency, accountability, adding that it would continue to engage openly on its operations.

Odeh clarified that NNPC had no regulatory or allocative authority over the licensing round, noting that the Petroleum Industry Act places responsibility for conducting oil licensing rounds, allocating oil blocks on the NUPRC.

On production, NNPC said available data showed crude oil output had increased from an average of 1.60 million barrels per day in April 2025 to 1.67 million barrels per day by April 2026, representing about six per cent growth.

The company said the figures were contained in its publicly available monthly performance reports, maintaining that the improvement reflected progress under Ojulari's leadership.