The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) has adopted a new leadership succession model modelled after the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN), in a move aimed at eliminating leadership tussles, ensuring continuity, and strengthening institutional stability.
Festus Osifo, PENGASSAN president, announced the constitutional reform on Saturday in Abuja during a tribute ceremony held in honour of the union’s late former President, Francis Johnson, whose death in office on May 31, 2019, exposed the challenges associated with sudden leadership transitions.
Osifo said the union amended its constitution in August 2025 to provide that an elected Deputy President would automatically succeed the President at the end of the incumbent’s tenure, thereby removing the need for a separate contest for the office of president.
According to him, the reform followed a comprehensive review of succession practices across major professional and membership organisations in Nigeria, with PENGASSAN concluding that the ICAN model offered the most effective framework for ensuring orderly leadership transition.
“We examined different succession models, including that of the Nigerian Bar Association, but found the ICAN model more suitable. Under ICAN’s arrangement, members contest for the office of the vice president, while the President emerges through succession. We have now adopted the same principle in PENGASSAN,” Osifo said.
