If anyone had volunteered to me that one or all of the nation’s four refineries-two in Port Harcourt, one in Warri, and one in Kaduna, will ever come alive again, before the August 2 meeting between President Bola Tinubu and Labour leaders, I would readily disagree and place a bet with whatever was at stake. And my conclusion was borne out of practical experience.
Too many stories have emanated from the refineries since the restart of democratic rule in 1999. In fact, such tales of woes about the travails of the refineries actually predated the return of democratic rule in Nigeria. In the days of the military, especially that of the late General Sani Abacha, talks of contract awards for Turn Around Maintenance of the refineries were commonplace. On the expiration of each contract, the stories usually changed and it was always a return to the status quo of zero refined products.
Between 2012 and 2013, I was part of a joint committee of the National Assembly which repeatedly toured the refineries. I remembered that we undertook extensive tours of the Port Harcourt refineries and on one occasion, we ended up at the Boardroom, where the Chief executive took us through several slides depicting the scope of work done and expected to be done between 2012 and late 2014. By November of 2014, we were told as a matter of fact, that the refineries in the Garden City would start full operation.
During the Boardroom meeting, we were told that the Original Refinery Builders (ORB) of the Port Harcourt refineries had nominated some partners to handle the TAM. We were also told that all the procurement needed to be undertaken have been done and funds are already in the accounts of the contractors. Nothing, in the estimation of the managers of the refinery, would stop the take-off of the refineries by November 2014.
The year 2014 ended without action. Around June 2015, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) announced that the refineries have commenced preliminary operations.
Ohi Alegbe, then spokesman of the NNPC said that the re-streaming of production at the two Port Harcourt refineries followed the completion of technical repairs by in-house engineers and technicians.
He said that both plants commenced preliminary production of petroleum products after successful test-runs adding that the refineries were projected to boost the nation’s local refining capacity with a product yield of five million litres of petrol per day, while Warri Refinery would contribute about 3.5 million litres of petrol to local refining capacity.
Alegbe gave further insights into the trajectory of the repairs of Port Harcourt by saying that the NNPC had already raised its operational capacity of 210,000 barrels per day to 60 per cent at the time, while it has also raised the production capacity of the 125,000 Warri refinery to 80 per cent.
He said that the phased rehabilitation of the refinery started in October 2014. That was contrary to whatever we heard from the Boardroom of the Port Harcourt refinery in 2013. what happened to the so-called contract that the NNPC said was paid for in 2013 and the completion date of November 2014?
Alegbe, however, further said that after the NNPC had established the required funding stream, reduced the funding pattern by 70 per cent and that activities would thereafter focus on the successful re-streaming of the 110,000 barrels per day Kaduna Refinery after the completion of work in Port Harcourt.
It should therefore come as a huge surprise that after such concrete assurances from the NNPC in 2015, the situation remained the same and the same-zero fuel production from the refineries persisted. Apart from the 2015 date, several other datelines have been provided by the NNPC, the last being December 2022 date. None came to fruition.
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But it was good that Nigerians never really took the promises from the NNPC to heart as evidenced by the fact that no one loses sweat whenever the deadlines snapped.
That is why I was seriously taken aback when President Bola Tinubu confidently told Labour leaders on August 2 that the refineries in Port Harcourt would come on stream on December 2023. He must have been listening to the managers of NNPCL. That to me is something premised on exaggerated hope.
I am sure that even the staff of the moribund refineries would have been shocked that the President had reposed so much trust on a promise from the NNPC, an agency that has never been known for keeping its words. It was as if the President was sticking his neck for the survival of a serial Abiku, one that is particularly stubborn as the one projected in Prof Wole Soyinka’s poem of the same title.
But as the Collins Dictionary of English Grammar would have it, hope is a feeling of desire and expectation that things will go well in the future. The Holy Bible, as seen in the book of Jeremiah 29:11, also notes the words of the Almighty which says: “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Tinubu, in the 2023 campaign had centred his campaign on “Renewed Hope.” If hope, in a secular and spiritual sense provides indications of expected joy and good news, renewed hope should encapsulate a double portion of joy, goodness, and mercy. Maybe that is where Tinubu’s assurances are coming from.
However, we need to remind Mr. Presidend that he is dealing with the NNPC here. An organisation whose operations remain the most opaque in the world. One that has perfected subterfuge to the heights and one which is never tired of raising excuses for its never-ending failures.
It is dangerous for the President to stick his neck to an organisation that has made itself synonymous with disappointment, failure, and economic doom. One which was saddled with the responsibility to manage the wealth of a nation sells the raw products for economic growth but happily squanders the proceeds and imports misery. It is curious that the organisation has repeated the unhelpful practices for decades.
