Failure to resuscitate refineries 3 years on, may embarrass FG today at NIPS
One of the most unexplainable embarrassments to the present government among the comity of oil producing economies as Nigeria begins to host the world at the Nigeria International Petroleum Summit (NIPS), is the moribund nature of all four national refineries. The event is billed to begin in Abuja from today, Monday, February 18 and will run till 22nd.
Part of the 2015 election campaign promises by the present government led by President Muhammadu Buhari was the revival of all the refineries and even the development of more across the six geographical zones.
But, that has failed to happen, barely three years on and less than one year to another election.
In fact, whereas fuel scarcity had been ravaging the country since the last quarter of last year, currently, the government has given signal that it will increase the pump price due to absence of working refineries and rising landing costs of petroleum products caused by rise in crude oil.
Nigerians who barred their minds over the weekend on how the government and especially the ministers in charge of the sector and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), will try to defend their failure in fixing the refineries to deliver refined products, said there is nothing on ground to warrant hosting such a summit.
According to them, such summits are hosted by countries that have star examples of developments worthy of emulation by international participants.
Business Hilights gathered weekend that the Secretary General of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Dr. Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo, will be leading other global oil and gas industry leaders to participate at the summit in Abuja.
Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, at a world press conference in Abuja, last week said the summit, which is patterned after the annual Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) which holds in Houston, Texas, is designed to attract new investments and showcase the latest technologies that could be adopted for the upstream, midstream and downstream sectors to ensure cost management in the Nigerian oil and gas industry.
He said the maiden edition of the NIPS which is scheduled to begin from today till 22nd February, 2018, would provide a veritable platform for the international oil companies and other relevant stakeholders to brainstorm on ways to move the Nigerian petroleum sector forward.
