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Nigeria wouldn’t have wasted $18billion if I had bought those refineries – Dangote
Aliko Dangote, President of the Dangote Group, on Thursday, returned to the issue of the sale of the nation’s refineries which went awry in 2007, indicating that had he not been forced to return them after initially buying them off from the Federal Government, Nigerian would not have sunk over $18billion to revitalise them, without any positive outcome.
The African Richest Man (ARM), now the proud owner of the first private refinery in Africa boasting of the world’s largest single-chain facility, worth over $20billion, spoke of how after buying off the facilities from the outgoing government of then President Olusegun Obasanjo, in 2007, the deal was reversed by Umoru Yar’Adua, his successor on advise of some Nigerians.
Narrating the incident on Thursday while hosting members of the Global CEO Africa from the Lagos Business School, after a tour of the Dangote Petroleum Refinery in Lekki, Lagos, the globally-acclaimed business mogul, spoke of how more than 50 percent of his refinery’s production — which was built after late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua’s administration blocked his bid to buy state refineries — now goes to petrol.
“The refineries that we bought before, which were owned by Nigeria, were doing about 22 per cent of PMS. We bought the refineries in January 2007. Then we had to return them to the government because there was a change of government. And the managing director at that time convinced Yar’Adua that the refineries would work.
“They said they just gave them to us as a parting gift or so. And as of today, they have spent about $18 billion on those refineries, and they are still not working. I don’t think and I doubt very much if they will work.
“The turnaround maintenance of the refineries is like you trying to modernise a car that was built 40 years ago, when technology and everything have changed. Even if you change the engine, the body will not be able to take the shock of that new technology engine.”
After sinking $2.1billion borrowed from foreign lenders into the Port Harcourt, the NNPCL, announced with official fanfare in November last year that the refinery had stated working again after many years and later added the the Warri to the list, while claiming that the one in Kaduna would also join soon, but recent events, seem to suggest that the naysayers, who claimed that the company’s officials were gaslighting Nigerians, were correct in their assessment.
The echoes of the drums rolled out to celebrate the rescue of the 44 teachers and students, kidnapped from some schools in Oyo State, after 56 days in the bush, would surely be disrupted abruptly, with the divergent echoes of a fresh abduction, this time coming from Kogi State.
Reports indicate that the gunmen, struck on Tuesday at the Government Secondary School, Odo-Ekina, in Dekina Local Government Area of the state, abducting four students, the school principal and a National Examinations Council (NECO) ad hoc staff member.
Authorities of the Kogi State Police Command, who immediately unleashed their operatives in hot pursuit of the abductors, said the attack occurred at about 5:25 p.m. while the students were writing their NECO examination.
Saliu Oyiza Afusat, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) and spokesman of the command, said a combined team of police personnel and other security agencies has launched a search-and-rescue operation following the incident.
Informing that one of the students was actually rescued immediately, she said efforts were ongoing to secure the release of the remaining victims and apprehend the attackers, adding that Naziru Bello Kankarofi, the state Commissioner of Police, alongside the Brigade Commander and the State Security Adviser to the Governor, Commodore Jerry Omodara (Rtd), were already on the way to the scene for an on-the-spot assessment.
Oil prices are expected to go down now with the announcement of Donald Trump, US President that he will no longer impose a 20 percent “safe passage” fee on ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz.
The POTUS, hinged his reversal of the decision on the intervention from some Gulf countries, who pleaded with him not to toe the line due to the massive economic impact the decision would make on the region.
Indeed, oil prices had shot up immediately Trump announced the new levy on Monday while declaring the US ‘the guardians of the Hormuz strait,’ a measure which he said was to pay for the cost of guarding the volatile area in order keep supply of oil flowing.
Reports said that Gulf allies of the US worked frantically to get Trump on the phone in time to talk him out of the idea altogether, while a flurry of appeals came from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar.
In response, the POTUS, posting on his Truth Social platform, wrote: “Based on highly productive conversations with Middle East leadership, I have decided to replace the 20% United States Reimbursement Fee with Trade and Investment Deals that the various Gulf States will be making into the United States.”
Trump, who said the investments would be “MASSIVE but, at the same time, extraordinarily good for them, and their future,” added that the deals would see factories, plants, and equipment pour into the US at “Historic levels.”
The Gulf nations have committed to invest trillions of dollars in the US, though it remains unclear how much of that they will actually spend over the next several years.
Meanwhile, the US continues to bomb Iran in what appears to be a resumption of active conflict between both countries, despite an ongoing roadmap to end the conflict.
Reports say operatives of the Osun State Police Command, and those of the Department of State Services (DSS) had tracking the trail of Adeniyi Adeyemi, controversial Director General of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), for weeks, before he was eventually pulled out of his hole on Tuesday.
However, the duo, were said to have pulled back after failing to track him through his mobile phones, which he had reportedly switched off for about two days, making it difficult to locate him, leaving the stage for the members of the Police Intelligence Response Team (PI-RT) led by Moses Lohor, a Chief Superintendent of Police (CSP).
Lohor, said to have previously served as the Commander of the Anti-Kidnapping Squad of Osun State, and reported to have been involved in high-profile security operations and controversies, after taken over fielded his men to pick up signals from their well-oiled signal networks.
Regarded by many Osun residents as one of the key security officers who contributed significantly to the peace and stability enjoyed in Ilesa and other parts of the state during his tenure, he was said to have relied on his contacts before his transfer out of the state, said to have raised concerns from the public about the security situation he would be leaving behind.
His exit from the state was said to be hinged on an incident in 2024, in which he allegedly shot one Iyanda Alowonle, then Chairman of Osun State Motor Transport System, in the stomach at the police station in the state prompting an order for his arrest by then Inspector General of Police (IGP).
His effort was said to have paid off when he successfully tracked down the controversial PFIPC, boss, who was seen on Tuesday evening, in a shot video on social media undergoing interrogation, and eventually handed him over to Ibrahim Gotan, Commissioner of Police in the state.
The PUNCH quoted one of the sources as saying: “The arrest (of Adeyemi) took place on Tuesday morning by the IRT squad, who immediately moved him to Abuja. After he was arrested, he was taken to Ibadan and from there to Abuja.”
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