The growing show of poor performance by refurbished refineries has become a leeway for the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to continue to press for their sales to private operators.
Latest monthly oil and gas sector report has shown that the combined performance of the refineries, with respect to capacity utilisation, has dropped by 44.87 per cent.
Figures from the June 2017 financial and operations report, which was released on Friday, showed that the corporation lost N5.2bn in June, while its year-to-date loss increased to N48.02bn.
In terms of consolidated operational performance, the refineries’ capacity utilisation dropped from 23.09 per cent in May 2017, to 12.73 per cent in June.
The three embattled refineries include Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company, Port Harcourt Refining Company, and Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company.
According to the report, the trio processed 434,419.2 metric tonnes of crude in May, but this reduced to 231,836 MT in June, despite receiving 753,548 MT of crude in the month under review.
This is as their consolidated percentage loss also increased to 2.44 per cent in June, as against the 2.05 per cent that was recorded in the previous month.
It would be recalled that even though the corporation’s executives have been playing hide and sick game on the veiled plan to sale the refineries, fresh hint was recently dropped by the Minister of State, Dr. Ibe Kachukwu who averred that government will be forced to sale refineries performing below 15 per cent of installed capacities.
