According to Ajuri Ngelale, President Tinubu’s Special Advisor on Media and Publicity, four significant refineries should be completely operating in the next 12 to 16 months. He said there will be significant savings because there won’t be any more foreign cash spent on importing these products once the domestic refineries are up and running.
He stated that the Dangote refinery alone is expected to produce 650,000 barrels per day, with the Port Harcourt refinery adding 200,000 barrels per day by the first quarter of the following year. He noted that when combined with the Warri and Kaduna refineries, there will be an opportunity to sell the surplus overseas, generating significant revenue in dollars. He urged Nigerians to be patient, as the envisioned benefits are seen as the light at the end of the tunnel.
He said in an interview with TVC, ”I think it is essential that we inform our people very aggressively about our plans. 4 major refineries are going to be coming on stream fully within the next 12 to 16 months. How does that link with this? Right now we are paying hundreds of millions into the billions of dollars to import refined PMS from foreign refineries. We are paying hundreds of millions of dollars for the shipping of these products alone.
Once our refineries are working, we will immediately stop all of the expenditures that we are currently expending in foreign exchange for these products. And the other side of it is that while we are stopping these expenditures of this foreign exchange, we are now adding new foreign exchange inflow with the supply of dollars that will be coming from the export of the surplus refined PMS that we are refining within the country. Right now we have a demand of about 450,000 barrels per day equivalent of refined PMS.
So what is going to happen is that the Dangote refinery alone is doing 650,000 barrels per day, this year it will be fully up and running. Then in addition to that, we will have the Port Harcourt refinery of 200,000 barrels per day, this year it will be fully up and running. Then in addition to that, we will have the Port Harcourt refinery of 200,00 barrels per day capacity fully running by the first quarter of next year.
With the addition of the Warri and Kaduna refineries, we will be in a position to now sell overseas to our neighbors in dollars. You will now know the tens of billions of dollars annually that we will be accruing that we are already losing So this is why we are telling our people to hang on a little bit and be patient with us. We see the light at the end of the tunnel.”
