Ex-President Obasanjo Reveals NNPC Rejected $750m Refinery Deal with Dangote

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has revealed that in 2007, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) rejected a $750 million offer by billionaire businessman Aliko Dangote to manage the Port Harcourt and Kaduna refineries under a Public–Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement.  

Speaking during an interview monitored by Radio Now’s Newsdesk, Obasanjo explained that Dangote had assembled a team and paid the sum to participate in the PPP initiative. However, the NNPC, now known as the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), insisted it could manage the refineries, despite lacking the capacity to do so.  

“When I was president, I wanted to do something about the three refineries we had. Portakal, Warwick, Angadu. And Alekudango, they got a team.After I have asked Shell, come and run it for us, and Shell said they wouldn’t. I said, please, come and take equity, you know. All right, no, don’t take equity.Come and run it. They said no. Later on, I called them. I called the boss of Shell then. Come and tell me what it is. And he gave me four or five reasons. I said, well, first of all, we make our major profit from upstream, not from downstream. Downstream, we run just to maintain our head, keep our head above water. Two, our refineries are too small. 60,000 barrels, 100,000 barrels, and I think 120,000 barrels. He said at that time, average refinery is going for 250,000 barrels. Three, he said our refineries are not well maintained. Four, he said there was too much corruption around the activities of our refinery, and they would not want to get involved in that.”

Also Read: Former President Obasanjo Thanks Gowon for Saving Him from Execution Under Abacha

Obasanjo said his successor later refunded Dangote’s money, a decision he questioned driven by his belief that the NNPC cannot run the refineries.

“And it was after that Aleko got a team together and they paid $750 million to take part in PPP running the refinery. My successor refunded their money and I went to my successor. I said, do you know, I told him what to transfer.He said NNPC said they wanted the refinery and they can’t run it. And I said, but you know they cannot run it. But I was told not too long ago that since more than $2 billion have been squandered on the refinery and this deal will not work. Anybody can tell. If a company like Shell tells me what they told me, I will believe them. (0:43) If anybody tells you now that it is working, why are they now with Aleko? And Aleko will (0:50) make its own refinery work.Not only make it work, it will make it deliver.”

The former President, who led Nigeria as a civilian leader from 1999 to 2007 and as a military head of state between 1976 and 1979, expressed regret over the missed opportunity to improve the nation’s refining capacity.