Aliko Dangote has expressed serious doubts about the future of Nigeria’s state-owned oil refineries, saying they may never become operational again even after nearly $18 billion has been spent on them.
Speaking while hosting executives from the Lagos Business School’s Global CEO Africa group at his Lekki-based refinery, Dangote said the Port Harcourt, Warri, and Kaduna plants under the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) have failed to deliver results, despite repeated investments and repairs.
He recalled that his company acquired the refineries in early 2007 but had to return them months later when a change in government led to the deal being cancelled. The Yar’Adua administration, according to Dangote, had been convinced by NNPC officials that they could revive the refineries on their own.
However, many years and billions of dollars later, the refineries remain idle. Dangote likened the government’s effort to trying to upgrade a 40-year-old car with new technology, saying the outdated systems cannot support modern operations even with new parts.
He also compared the output of the old refineries to that of his own. While government refineries once allocated only 22% of their production to petrol, the Dangote Refinery now produces over 50% petrol from its 650,000 barrels-per-day capacity.
His comments back those made by former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who has also criticised NNPC’s handling of the facilities. Obasanjo said international oil companies like Shell had refused to operate the refineries in the past because they were not viable. He added that when he handed over to Yar’Adua, he warned that the refineries would never work again and might eventually not be worth even $200 million as scrap.
Obasanjo described the continued spending on the refineries as wasteful and accused NNPC of knowingly mismanaging them while benefitting from systemic corruption. He stated that if the refineries were functional, the government wouldn’t need to rely on Dangote’s facility.
Calls for the government to privatise the plants have grown louder, especially after the recent shutdowns of both the Warri and Port Harcourt refineries shortly after they were declared operational. Industry groups like the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria have described them as financial liabilities and urged a shift toward modular refineries.
Despite multiple funding allocations—including $1.4 billion for Port Harcourt, $897 million for Warri, and $586 million for Kaduna—the plants remain non-functional. Records also show that between 2013 and 2017, over $396 million was spent on turnaround maintenance alone.
Efforts to get a response from NNPC were unsuccessful, as contact numbers on the corporation’s website were unreachable, and messages sent had not been answered at the time of reporting.
