The Federal Government Thursday revealed that the planned revamping of the Port Harcourt refinery would cost the country about $300 million.
Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, made the disclosure at a sitting of the Senate Ad-hoc Committee on “the planned concession of the Port Harcourt Refinery to Agip/Eni and Oando Plc.”
Chairman of the committee, Senator Abubakar Kyari, took on the Minister on the statement credited to him that the Federal Government was sourcing for investors to take over the Port Harcourt Refinery.
Senator Dino Melaye, a member of the committee, wanted Kachikwu to tell the committee whether the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) of the concession had been signed. Melaye also asked the Minister to react to another report that approval for the concession had already been given by the Federal Government.
In his response, the Minister told the committee that as the driver of the policy, there has never been any approval by President Muhammadu Buhari for the concession of the Port Harcourt Refinery.
He noted that what was decided was that government will no longer put money for the turn around maintenance of refineries in the country but would look for private funding for the repair and revamping of the refineries, including the Port Harcourt Refinery.
He said that 26 investors have already indicated interest to repair the Port Harcourt Refinery, which made them to set up a technical committee to vet the investors for the selection of a credible investor that would do the work.
Kachikwu said that from the input of the technical committee, it will cost about $300 million to revamp the refinery. Repairing the four refineries in the country, he said, would gulp over $1.2 billion.
On terms of repayment of investors, Kachikwu said the arrangement is “give us the money we pay back by incremental volumes.” (The Sun)
