The Dangote industries limited has accused other oil companies in Nigeria of planning to frustrate the work of the new Dangote oil Refinery, according to the vice president of the Dangote Refinery industries.
The vice president, Mr .Edwin said the IOCs were “deliberately and willfully frustrating” their refinery’s efforts when they wanted to buy local crude. They did this by hiking the cost of crude oil above the market price. This had made the refinery import crude from the United States, at a very high costs.
He disclosed this while speaking to journalists at the one day training program , that was organised by the Dangote group on Friday. Mr Edwin went further to access the Nigerian midstream and Downstream regulations authority for granting licence to importers who go as far as importing dirty products into the country.The federal government according to Mr. Edwin issued 25 licences for the construction of refineries in Nigeria, but he ascertained that it was only the Dangote groups that delivered.“
The Federal Government issued 25 licences to build refineries and we are the only one that delivered on our promise. In effect, we deserve every support from the government. It is good to note that from the start of production, more than 3.5 billion litres, which represents 90 per cent of our production, have been exported. We are calling on the Federal Government and regulators to give us the necessary support to create jobs and prosperity for the nation,” Edwin stated.He also said that though the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission did try to allocate crude oil for the 650,000-capacity refinery, “the IOCs are deliberately and willfully frustrating our efforts to buy the local crude.”
He said that the IOCs sometimes make the Dangote Refinery to buy crude oil at $6 which is above the market price, thereby forcing the country to go to countries like the United States to buy crude oil at a very high cost.
He said, “Recall that the NUPRC recently met with crude oil producers as well as refineries’ owners in Nigeria, in a bid to ensure full adherence to Domestic Crude Oil Supply Obligations as enunciated under section 109(2) of the Petroleum Industry Act. It seems that the IOCs’ objective is to ensure that our petroleum refinery fails. It is either they are deliberately asking for a ridiculous/humongous premium or they simply state that crude is not available. At some point, we paid $6 over and above the market price. This has forced us to reduce our output as well as import crude from countries as far as the US, increasing our cost of production.”
“It appears that the objective of the IOCs is to ensure that Nigeria remains a country which exports crude oil and imports refined petroleum products. They (IOCs) are keen on exporting the raw materials to their home countries, creating employment and wealth for their countries, adding to their Gross Domestic Product, and dumping the expensive refined products into Nigeria – thus making us dependent on imported products. It is the same strategy the multinationals have been adopting in every commodity, making Nigeria and Sub-Saharan Africa to be facing unemployment and poverty, while they create wealth for themselves at our expense.”
“This is exploitation – pure and simple. Unfortunately, the country is also playing into their hands by continuing to issue import licences at the expense of our economy and at the cost of the health of the Nigerians who are exposed to carcinogenic products.”
“licences are being issued, in large quantities, to traders who are buying the extremely high sulphur diesel from Russia and dumping it in the Nigerian market.”
Edwin explained, “Since the US, European Union and the United Kingdom imposed a price cap scheme from February 5, 2023, on Russian petroleum products, a large number of vessels are waiting near Togo with Russian ultra-high sulphur diesel and they are being purchased and dumped into the Nigerian market.
“Some of the European countries were so alarmed about the carcinogenic effect of the extra high sulphur diesel being dumped into the Nigerian market that countries like Belgium and the Netherlands imposed a ban on such fuel being exported from its country, into West Africa recently. Sadly, the country is giving import licences for such dirty diesel to be imported into Nigeria when we have more than adequate petroleum refining capacity locally.”
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