THE EFFECTIVENESS OF PUBLIC RELATIONS PRACTICE IN THE OIL SECTOR (A CASE STUDY OF AFRICAN PETROLEUM PLC, PORT-HARCOURT)

ABSTRACT

    African petroleum Plc, a Marketer of petroleum products and chemicals, knows that public support and goodwill as well as good corporate image are very important for business success. Tends to be influenced by their publics which includes, its staff, shareholders, customers and of course members of the press.

    The company is actually very much interested to know its public problem areas and opportunities with the aim to improving the organization’s overall performance to enable them know what their public thinks about African petroleum public Relations programme and quality of services of the organization to its publics.

The researcher therefore decided to embark on this study with the objectives.

    The objectives of the study are:

To determine the extent of AP’S public Relations messages accessibility to their publics and also find out whether AP’s public relations practices influence the opinion of their publics.

Relevant data based on the scope of the study were collected through primary and secondary data with structured questionnaire as the main instrument administered to two hundred and fifty (250) respondents comprising forty African petroleum staff, sixty share holders, one hundred and twenty customers and thirty members of the press.

The questionnaire was highly structured and opended where necessary. The questions and the response were very standard to facilitate comparison of responses and to secure good control of the questions, chi-square (x²) was used to analyse the hypotheses formulated.

Among the findings were that the African Petroleum Public Relations Media Message and quality of their overall services are satisfactory through their mobilization programmes and enlightenment campaign but needs more efforts. AP’s Public Relation’s Practice influences their publics to favour her products through persuasive and convincing communication. The following recommendation was made; AP should always engage in a constant evaluation of their public relations practice and its effectiveness to identify any short comings. Media combination should be reviewed to always embrace appreciable coverage.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title Page                                                                         i

Approval Page                                                                  ii

Dedication                                                                       iii

Acknowledgement                                                            iv

Abstract                                                                           v

Table of Content                                                              vii

CHAPTER ONE:     

INTRODUCTION

1.1   Background to the study                                         1

1. Statement of problem                                              4
2. Objective of the study                                              6
3. Scope and limitation of  study                                 6
4. Significance of the study                                          7
5. Research question                                                   8
6. Definition of terms                                                   9

CHAPTER TWO:     

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1   What is public relation                                            11

• Role of public relations executives in

commercial out fit                                                            26

• Strategy and scope of public relations programme   28
• Frame work of public relations programme              37
• Importance of public relations in all oil industry.    39

         References

CHAPTER THREE: 

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1   Research design                                                       45

3.2   Method of data collection                                         45

3.2.1        Primary data collection                                           46

3.2.2 Secondary data collection                                               46

3.3   Sample size                                                              46

3.4   Sampling techniques                                                       47

3.5   Data analysis techniques                                                 48

        References                                                               48

CHAPTER FOUR:

PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS OF DATA

4.1   Table of responses to sex                                         56

• Indication of free access to AP’s public

        References                      

CHAPTER FIVE:    

5.1      Summary                                                              72

5.1.2           Summary of findings                                            74

5.2     Recommendations                                                 75

5.4   Conclusions                                                             76

Bibliography                                                            78

Appendix                                                                         83

CHAPTER ONE

1.0   INTRODUCTION

1.1   BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

        The history of African petroleum Plc date back to 1954 when the then British petroleum BP company Limited, brought up the assets of Atlantic refining company on the West African coast Ten years later (1964) that company was incorporated in Nigeria as British Petroleum of Nigeria Limited which of course is a subsidiary of the world wide British petroleum Group that marketed petroleum product throughout the Federal Republic of Nigeria. In 1978, the company changed from a private company to a public company, when forty percent (40%) of the shares were sold to Nigerian citizens in compliance with provisions of the Nigeria Enterprises promotions degree of 1977. On the 31^st July 1979, the Federal Government acquired the sixty percent (60%) share in British petroleum (BP) Limited, just to make the company wholly Nigeria affair. As a result, the name of the company had to change to African Petroleum (AP) Limited which was in November 1979.

        Accordingly, 20% of the Federal Governments 60% shares in African petroleum were offered to the public in March 1989 in fulfillment of its privatization policy. The share were seven times over subscribed during the exercise, thus increasing the number of share holders from about fifty thousand to one hundred and sixty thousand share holders. The company’s current paid up share capital of N 86.4M which of course is the largest in the country.

        As a marketer of refined petroleum in Nigeria, African Petroleum (AP) procures and distributes petroleum products like petrol (PMS), Diesel oil  (AGO), Household kerosene or Domestic petroleum kerosene (HHK/DPK), Low poor fuel oil (LPFO), Liquefied petroleum Gas (LPG), fuel oil, Jet-A-1 (Aviation furbric kerosene) etc the company also manufacture and market a wide range of lubricants, insecticide and chemicals. This company’s marketing operation areas are Kaduna, Kano, Port – Harcourt, Warri.

        African petroleum plc has its head office in Lagos. The main source of its products is the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) through its strategic network depots and refineries. As contained in its Diary (1998) African petroleum is a world class integrated petroleum company where outstanding and dedicated people supported by superior technology deliver exceptional benefits to its shareholders”. Their mission is to be an innovative and customer oriented, provider of quality petroleum and related products and services”.

        Businesses are open systems, and most of what they do generates direct benefits and costs for their societies. Today society demands that businesses join in the urgent task of solving societies, problems. Corporations are more than economic institutions and have a responsibility to devote some of their resources problems mainly of which corporations helped to create.

        However, small or large our enterprise, we cannot isolate our business from the society around us. Nor can we function without its goodwill. I therefore tried to x-ray the public relations(PR) practice in African petroleum plc to assess its effectiveness in building desired goodwill imperative to healthy business survivability.