KEY POINTS
- Obasanjo insists Nigeria’s state-owned refineries will never work again due to corruption and structural failures.
- He cited failed attempts to involve Shell and the reversal of a Dangote acquisition deal as key missed opportunities.
- NNPCL continues efforts to revive the refineries, targeting 2026 for technical partner selection.
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has again declared that Nigeria’s state-owned refineries operated by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited will never function effectively again, despite ongoing efforts by the government to revive them through technical partnerships.
He made the remarks during a televised interview on Sony Irabor Live, where he revisited long-standing challenges in Nigeria’s downstream oil sector.
Obasanjo argued that public-private partnerships (PPPs) are effective when properly structured, pointing to the success of the Nigeria LNG Limited as an example where private sector involvement improved efficiency.
However, he insisted that Nigeria’s refineries, located in Port Harcourt, Warri, and Kaduna, have consistently failed due to structural and operational weaknesses.
According to him, the facilities are beyond practical rehabilitation and will continue to underperform regardless of investment or management changes.
Dangote Offer and Reversal of Sale
He also recalled that industrialist Aliko Dangote once offered $750 million to acquire a majority stake in two refineries during his administration.
According to Obasanjo, the deal was approved and payment made, but later reversed under the administration of the late President Umaru Yar’Adua due to pressure from the Nigerian National Petroleum Company.
He argued that the reversal contributed to Nigeria’s continued refinery failures and wasted investment opportunities.
Obasanjo further claimed that Nigeria has already spent about $16 billion attempting to fix the refineries, an amount he said is close to the cost of building Africa’s largest private refinery.
He insisted that only recent leadership within NNPCL has been honest about the true condition of the facilities, noting continued inefficiency despite partial rehabilitation efforts in 2024.
The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited has continued efforts to attract technical partners to manage and operate the refineries.
In November 2025, the company set a target of June 2026 to finalise partnerships, following repeated setbacks in earlier rehabilitation attempts.
Despite temporary restarts of the Port Harcourt and Warri refineries in 2024, officials admitted the facilities remain far below global operating standards and uncompetitive compared to privately owned plants such as the Dangote Refinery.
