As President Muhammadu Buhari officially inaugurates Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals, Lekki in Lagos on Monday, Nigerians have taken a swipe on failure of the outgoing administration to fix the moribund refineries in the country.
Owned by Aliko Dangote, the refinery has a capacity to process about 650,000 barrels per day of crude oil, expected to be Africa’s biggest oil refinery and the world’s biggest single-train facility,
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The refinery will process a variety of light and medium grades of crude to produce Euro-V quality clean fuels including gasoline and diesel as well as jet fuel and polypropylene.
Dangote Oil Refinery, a company owned by the Nigeria-based Dangote Group, is developing the project with an estimated investment of $19 billion.
Nigeria’s Federal Executive Council (FEC) approved the acquisition of 20% minority stake in the project by state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) for $2.76 billion in August 2021.
The integrated refinery and petrochemical project is expected to generate 9,500 direct and 25,000 indirect jobs.
A group of local and international banks led by Standard Chartered Bank provided a $3.3 billion syndicated loan facility for the project.
The United States Trade and Development Agency is providing an N251.3 billion ($0.997m) training grant for the human resource development for the refinery operation.
Engineers India is the engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contractor for the project. Honeywell UOP was contracted to supply catalyst regeneration and dryer regeneration control systems, column trays, heat exchanger tubes, a modular CCR unit, and catalyst coolers among other equipment.
C&I Leasing was contracted to provide transportation and installation services for mooring systems and subsea pipelines of the refinery.
Hang Xiao Steel Structure Company received a $112 million contract to provide steel structure for the refinery. Jan De Nul Group was engaged for carrying out land reclamation works.
MAN Diesel & Turbo was contracted to supply two compressor trains, while Air Liquide Engineering & Construction was contracted for supplying the SMR units.
Sulzer Chemtech, a fluid engineering company based in Switzerland, was contracted to supply column internals, packings, and trays for the Dangote refinery in July 2020.
Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI), a company based in South Korea, received an order worth $58m to build 15 liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) tanks for the refinery project in April 2018.
Mammoet, a Dutch heavy lifting and transport company, was contracted to provide heavy lifting and transport solutions for the project in January 2018.
Fabtech (18 columns), Schneider Electric (process automation systems), SOFEC (Catenary Anchor Leg Mooring buoys), and WABAG (raw water treatment plant) are the other suppliers involved in the Dangote refinery project.
Actually, Nigeria is said to produce whopping N116 trillion, or about 98 per cent of the total crude oil sold since 1960.
The Dangote Group was established in 1981 as a small trading firm in 1977, the same year Dangote relocated to Lagos to expand the company.
Dangote received a N500,000 loan from his uncle to begin trading in commodities, including bagged cement as well as such agricultural goods as rice and sugar.
The CBN Governor, Mr. Emefiele did mention that Aliko Dangote has already invested about 50 per cent of the $9 billion needed to complete the project.
The remaining 50% would be sourced as loans from both local and foreign lenders. In a nutshell, Dangote had done what Nigeria, as a country, couldn’t do for years.
Nigerians react
However, Nigerians have taken to their Twitter handle to commend Mallam Dangote for completing the project while seeing the project as a failure of the Federal Government in abandoning four refineries for an individual to have completed his own.
Cuthy in his Twitter handle was disillusioned ‘‘Imagine an individual or company started and finished a refinery but the Government could not repair or build yet are quick to celebrate the feat. But still paying salary for years and taking money for repairs. Fraud.’’
Omo Iya Teacher noted ‘‘Nigeria has had a crude oil production value of a whopping N116 trillion, or about 98% of the total crude oil sold since 1960. With all that generated revenue, Nigeria couldn’t build a new refinery, much less to maintain the old one.
”The nature of the financial facility of Dangote Refinery is not exactly at the moment and the CBN Governor, Mr. Emefiele did mention that Aliko Dangote has already invested about 50% of the $9 million needed to complete the project. The remaining 50% will be sourced as loans from both local and foreign lenders. In a nutshell, Dangote had done what Nigeria, as a country, could not do for years. Nigeria is a failed state,” he tweeted.
Chinwe Duruaku-Agu, in his Twitter handle stated ‘‘They killed Collective to celebrate Single. What happened to the Nigerian Refineries? What a long 40 year thoughtful Masterplan executed in a space of 8 years. The Supremacy of Islam in Nigeria by Buhari at last. But we wait on God the Author & Finisher. Congratulations Dangote.’’
Y Minister tweeted ”Buhari has finished his tenure without fixing a single refinery open all the promising he made during campaign.
Sani, in his Twitter handle, wrote ”You people should convince Dangote to name the Muhammadu Buhari Refinery. If he refuses, don’t worry, we can name a few barrels per day after Buhari instead.”
