Nigeria’s ambition to earn as much as $2.5 billion annually from carbon finance may be undermined by weak legal foundations, according to international energy negotiator and former Attorney General of Lagos State, Olasupo Shasore.
Reacting to the federal government’s newly released National Carbon Market Framework (NCMF), the senior lawyer warned that the policy cannot achieve its intended scale without enforceable laws to support it.
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The framework, introduced to position Nigeria for between $2.5 and $3 billion in carbon revenues over the next decade, outlines how the country hopes to participate in international carbon markets and deliver on its climate commitments.
But in a paper shared with PREMIUM TIMES, Mr Shasore argued that the initiative remains exposed because it currently operates only as a policy roadmap rather than a law with binding obligations.
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According to him, the initiative, although promising, is exposed to risks because the current framework functions only as a policy guideline and not as enforceable law.
Conditions
He further stated that the mechanism depends heavily on ministerial discretion and voluntary participation from industry players.
This arrangement, the 61-year-old said, could result in uneven enforcement, weak compliance, and reduced investor trust.
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He said: “Crucially, without statutory authority, essential mechanisms like Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification (MRV), dispute resolution, and sanctions lack the necessary legal force to ensure the credibility and accountability required for high-integrity carbon transactions. The proposed Decarbonisation Bill (DB.) is posited as the critical solution to close this ‘policy-to-practice gap’ transforming climate delivery into a legally binding and enforceable system.
“This Bill would establish a legally-empowered National Decarbonisation Authority (NDA), moving Nigeria from a policy coordination model to a rule-of-law-based governance structure. The NDA would be vested with unified authority to centralise oversight, licensing, compliance, and enforcement, thereby addressing the institutional fragmentation and regulatory competition that arises from the NCMF adding new coordinating bodies—like the Carbon Market Governance Committee—alongside existing ones, such as the National Council on Climate Change (NCCC).”
Decarbonisation Bill
He noted that the Decarbonisation Bill would establish the legal framework needed to uphold the credibility of the carbon market and formally empower the NDA to oversee MRV activities.
Mr Shasore explained that this framework would require independent verification, the use of satellite tracking, and the development of a publicly accessible national carbon registry.
In his view, these measures are crucial to ensuring Nigeria’s carbon credits align with ICVCM requirements and to preventing the integrity failures and double-counting issues that affected earlier voluntary carbon market projects across Africa.
“The financial framework also demands legal certainty. While the NCMF promises fiscal incentives, these remain subject to executive discretion. The Decarbonisation Bill, by contrast, seeks to institutionalise predictable financing mechanisms by establishing the National Green Transition Fund (NGTF), capitalised by statutory levies, green bonds, and first-loss provisions to de-risk private capital.
“This structured approach ensures that fiscal mechanisms survive political transitions, a key weakness of the current NCMF. Beyond finance, the Bill transforms community protection from a policy commitment into a legal right by embedding a Just Transition Fund, mandating transparent benefit-sharing structures, local reinvestment, and livelihood programmes”, said Mr Shasore.
The alumnus of Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) further noted that putting clear legal provisions in place would help keep decarbonisation fair and politically sustainable, offering better protection for communities most at risk.
The author of “Ministering Justice: Administration of Justice in Nigeria” observed that a major shortcoming of the NCMF is its limited treatment of methane (CH₄), the world’s second most powerful greenhouse gas, even though Nigeria generates significant volumes across its oil and gas operations and waste sites.
He explained that the proposed Decarbonisation Bill aims to provide a more comprehensive framework for reducing, capturing, and managing methane emissions, enabling measurable improvements and opening up a wider, largely untapped carbon market.
Mr Shasore also pointed out that the NCMF’s dependence on the voluntary carbon market prevents Nigeria from accessing the larger, more lucrative, and more tightly regulated compliance market that aligns with international best practice.
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