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Tag: Timipre Sylva

  • $1.5bn Port Harcourt Refinery Repair: Nigerians Should Hold Me Accountable For Every Dollar Spent –Sylva

    $1.5bn Port Harcourt Refinery Repair: Nigerians Should Hold Me Accountable For Every Dollar Spent –Sylva

     

    The minister of state for petroleum resources, Timipre Sylva, says Nigerians should hold him accountable “for every dollar, every cent” spent on the rehabilitation of the Port Harcourt refinery.

     

    He said President Muhammadu Buhari wants to leave behind a legacy of functional refineries for Nigerians.

     

    Nigeria has four refineries — two in Port Harcourt and one each in Kaduna and Warri — with a combined capacity of 445,000 barrels per day. All four refineries are non-functional, after being shut down in 2020.

     

    On Wednesday, the federal executive council (FEC) meeting approved $1.5 billion for the rehabilitation of the Port Harcourt refinery.

     

    The approval has since elicited critical reactions from various quarters, particularly from notable Nigerians like Atedo Peterside, Peter Obi, and Atiku Abubakar.

     

    Speaking on Sunday during a Channels Television programme, Sylva said the Buhari administration means well.

     

    “They (Nigerians) can hold me accountable and hold this government accountable for every dollar, every cent on this refinery and ensure that we deliver a refinery that works,” he said.

     

    “What President Muhammadu Buhari wants to leave as a legacy are refineries that are functional.

     

    “That is really where we are looking at because what is going to happen to those refineries will be decided by Nigerians and future administration.”

     

    ’18 MONTHS TO COMPLETE REHABILITATION’

     

    The minister noted that the rehabilitation will take 18 months and the first phase will get the refinery to 90 percent operational capacity.

     

    “We’re not lying to Nigerians. We’ve told you that this is going to be in three phases and the first phase is definitely going to be within the tenure of this administration,” he said.

     

    “You should hold us. It is 18 months and we are going to take the refinery to 90 percent of its main capacity and that is what you should hold us to.”

     

    THREE SOURCES TO FUND REHABILITATION

     

    Sylva gave a breakdown of how the government intends to source the $1.5 billion required to repair the refinery.

     

    “Let me tell you how this rehabilitation is going to be funded; it is not going to be all debts, we are not going to borrow all the monies that are going into the rehabilitation,” he said.

     

    “NNPC is going to spend about $200 million from its internally generated revenue sources, while the federal appropriation will put in about $800 million and it is already broken down into three parts.

     

    “The 2020 appropriation will give $350 million, 2021 appropriation will give another $350 million, and 2022 appropriation will give another $100 million, making it all $800 million from appropriation, and then the rest of it will now come from Afrexim Bank.”

     

    ‘LOT OF GAINS FOR NIGERIANS’

     

    Sylva said the rehabilitation of the refinery is “one way the government can generate revenue to invest in other sectors of the economy”.

     

    He said the refinery will benefit Nigerians and be commercially-viable “to produce profits for the government”.

     

    The minister added: “This rehabilitation will bring a lot of gains for Nigerians. First, we are gaining from savings in the foreign exchange end, savings from importation of premium motor spirit (PMS); and we will gain from the operations of the refineries itself.”

     

    Sylva noted that the Port Harcourt refinery, which has the capacity to produce 210,000 barrels per day, cannot satisfy Nigeria’s needs alone.

     

    “This refinery plus Dangote’s refinery, Kaduna refinery and Warri refinery will more than satisfy Nigeria’s requirements,” he added.

     

    “We are headed to a point where Nigeria will become a net exporter of refined petroleum products. So we will be able to satisfy Nigerians and also have excess in exporting these products.”

  • PIB: Petroleum Minister Faults Communities’ 10% Trust Fund Demand

    PIB: Petroleum Minister Faults Communities’ 10% Trust Fund Demand

    The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, has faulted the position of host communities who are insisting on collecting 10 per cent of the operating expenditure of the oil firms to set up a trust fund.

     

    The leaders of the oil rich areas under the aegis of the Host Communities of Nigeria Producing Oil and Gas, had on Tuesday, openly rejected the 2.5 per cent proposed for them in the Petroleum Industry Bill 2020, being considered by the joint Senate Committee on Petroleum Resources, (Downstream, Upstream and Gas).

     

    They insisted that nothing short of the 10 per cent of the operating expenditure they were demanding would be acceptable to them because the proposed 2.5 per cent was grossly inadequate to provide basic social amenities and improve the standard of living of their people.

     

    But the Minister, who spoke with journalists after the end of a two-day public hearing on the proposed bill by the Senate panel on Tuesday, faulted the argument of the oil communities’ leaders.

     

    He said, “The 2.5 per cent as proposed in the bill is fair and of course, I speak as a member of the host communities myself.

     

    “If you have to look at it properly, you will see that 10 per cent in profit is different from 10 per cent of the OPEX (operating expenditure).

     

    “Before now, you had a provision of 10 per cent of profit for the host communities but we discovered that if the oil firms do not declare it, host communities won’t have anything.

     

    “But in this case, it is 2.5 per cent of the operating expenditure. So, at the end of the year we will calculate the operating cost and take the 2.5 per cent of that cost to the budget of the next year.

     

    “Of course, I don’t like to discuss details of the bill at this point because these are just proposals before the National Assembly.

     

    “Until it is passed, we cannot discuss it but since it came up here, I thought I should just mention it.

     

    “As far as we are concerned, we have made a very fair proposal – fair to the host communities, fair to the country and fair to the oil companies.

     

    “We have put this bill before the National Assembly and they have the competence to look at it and pass it the way they see fit.

     

    “So, at this point I do not want to go into detailed aspect of the bill. The bill is before them and we are happy with the progress.

     

    “As you heard the Senate President say yesterday, we expect that this bill would be passed at the end of this quarter or early next month.”

     

    Leaders of the Host community of Oil Producing Areas also called on the Federal Government to scrap the Niger Delta Development Commission and transfer all its allocations to the them for effective management.

     

    The President of HOSTCOMS, High Chief Benjamin Tamaranebi, stated this while addressing journalists.

     

    He said with the reduction of host community development trust fund from 10 per cent in 2008 to 2.5 percent in 2020 PIB, the proposed document would deny the people of the required funds to develop their areas.

     

    Tamaranebi said the NDDC should be scrapped so that the allocation being given to the commission could be directly paid to HOSTCOMS for critical interventions especially after the revelations that followed the investigative hearing on the commission.