A financial analyst, Kelvin Emmanuel, has said that the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Ltd (NNPC) may be out to sabotage and cripple the operations of Dangote refinery even when the refinery is selling its products cheaper to NNPC than the imports.
Speaking on an Arise News program on Monday, Emmanuel said an indication of NNPC’s unhappiness could be linked to its deliberate inability to mobilize enough trucks to lift products from the refinery on Sunday.
“Government said they had up to 300 trucks mobilized but only 67 were brought to the Dangote refinery to load the product when there was enough to be lifted,” he said.
According to Emmanuel, about 193,000 metric tons of what he described as “substandard PMS” for which order had been placed by the NNPC would still land in the country this September. This is imported at 70 cents per litre, 15 cents higher than what Dangote is giving.
This is despite the fact that NNPC had said it would do backward integration by taking products from Dangote. And, the state oil company is still trying to blame Dangote for the increase in the price of PMS.
Emmanuel pointed out the major issues that drive the price of petroleum products in the market. First, he said Nigeria does not have control over the price of crude oil which has not changed much. Out of 32 million barrels per day OPEC output, Nigeria contributes only 1.4/1.5 million barrels per day.
“Dangote operates in a Free Trade Zone, pays all the required levies and stills at 55 cents on the dollar. In Ghana they are selling at $1.30, Canada $1.70, Singapore $2.70. Dangote is bending over backwards for Nigeria because it’s more profitable to export than sell in Nigeria,” he said.
Emmanuel pointed out that NNPC is owing international traders $6.8 billion. “In August it denied owing but in the first week of September it admitted it was owing. It neither has the crude oil feedstock or the cash to pay. Nigerians would rather believe Dangote than believe NNPC,” he further said.
