Senate halts sale of Port Harcourt refinery

The Senate, on Tuesday, ordered the Federal Ministry of Petroleum Resources and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to halt further action or planned concession of the Port Harcourt Refinery to AGIP and OANDO.

In a motion sponsored by Senator Sabo Mohammed and tagged ‘Non Transparent Transaction relating to the planned concession of the Port Harcourt Refinery to AGIP and OANDO by the Ministry of Petroleum Resources’, the Senate questioned the rationale behind the action.

Accordingly, the Senate has set up an adhoc committee to carry a holistic investigation to determine how and why such a deal was sealed and the criteria used to select AGIP and OANDO to maintain and operate the Port Hacourt Refinery at what cost and time-frame.

Senator Mohammed, in his motion, claimed that the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr Ibe Kachikwu, had revealed that the agreement was part of a broader government plan to increase capacity for local production and consumption of petroleum products with the aim of ending fuel importation in Nigeria by 2019.

The Jigawa born lawmaker, further observed that the planned concession of Port Harcourt , is without recourse to due process and described it as illegal and a clear attempt at ridiculing Nigerians. He said the action would create a hole that will be hard to fill in the anti-corruption crusade of the present administration.

He said the action by Kachikwu, goes contrary to claims he made in late 2015, when he declared the three refineries in the country, namely, Warri, Kaduna and Port Harcourt would be working at 90 per cent capacity, thereby reducing importation and subsidy controversies. The senator wondered why in 2017, the refineries were yet to be fixed and cannot produce 50 per cent.

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Senators Dino Melaye and Kabiru ‎Gaya, supported the motion and called on the Senate to take a firm action. Melaye in his submissions, said consessioning of government-owned companies, have always been mismanaged in the past.

Gaya on his part, said in the absence of Kaduna and Warri refineries which are currently dysfunctional, it will be unfair to sell off the Port Harcourt refinery to investors.

But Kachikwu, in far away Vienna, Austria, said refineries repair cannot be done in an open bidding process. Speaking to newsmen, Kachikwu said the refineries concession “is a highly technical area, what we have done is to invite those who have experience in refining, but it is open, anybody who feels he has the skills and has the money is welcome. It is not just about the skills but the money too.

“Remember, we do not have the money, and what we call them in is to rebuild, help us manage and recoup their money from the incremental production and that is ongoing, it has not been decided, the entire three refineries are up on the refurbishing scheme.”

Responding to the alleged bias in the selection process of the AGIP and OANDO Plc as partners to operate the Port Harcourt Refinery and Petrochemical Company, Kachikwu said final decision on the refineries has not been reached.

He said the Federal Government has decided to concession all four refineries in the country by August this year saying, “We hope to award the contracts by July/August and hopefully between 12 to 18 months to be able to get the refineries fully back, and the model is to bring investors, who will repair the refineries and they recoup their money from the incremental production.

“We are ready to offer all the three refineries for investors who have money to repair and manage. People keep mentioning AGIP and OANDO Plc but nobody has made the final decision on those, they are probably the front runners because they put a lot of work on that but I am not in the technical committee, I am the chair of the steering committee, when the technical committee meet and finish their work, they will refer it to the steering committee and then it goes to NNPC Board, so all the hullabaloo about the transparency, there is no basis for that.”

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