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The Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL)Bayo Ojulari, has said that the Port Harcourt refinery loses N500 million every month while operating the Port Harcourt refinery before suspending rehabilitation works at the facility.
While addressing journalists on Thursday with a delegation in Abuja from the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) led by President Festus Osifo stated that years of neglect have led to what has been happening.
Ojulari attributed the refinery’s poor performance to years of neglect and fundamental structural problems that made profitable operations impossible.
“When I resumed, one of the priorities I focused on was the refineries, to have a quick review, to see whether we could quickly fix it,” he explained. “What I found is that we were losing between N300 million to N500 million monthly on the overall refinery. For Port Harcourt, we were sending in about 950,000 barrels as cargo, but less than 40 per cent was coming out.”
The NNPC chief claimed that structural design problems significantly worsened the facility’s efficiency challenges. He clarified widespread misconceptions about the refinery’s configuration, explaining that what people commonly refer to as separate “old” and “new” refineries were actually designed as interconnected units.
“You hear old refinery, new refinery. That’s the wrong information. The way it was designed, the old was meant to feed into the new for the end product to meet market standards,” Ojulari said.
With only portions of the refinery operational, the facility was producing substandard products that couldn’t compete commercially in the marketplace. “That mid-grade product was at a significant loss to all of us. That’s why we decided to stop rather than continue bleeding resources,” he added.
Ojulari emphasised that President Bola Tinubu had given him clear instructions to pursue sustainable reforms rather than maintain operations for political appearances, even if this meant temporary shutdowns.
“There’s no need for us to pretend. There was no pressure to just continue to run at a loss. The directive is to find a way that works sustainably and creates jobs,” the NNPC boss stated.
Despite the current challenges, Ojulari reaffirmed that the company has no intention of selling the Port Harcourt refinery. Instead, he promised the facility would undergo “high-grade rehabilitation” to ensure it becomes profitable in the long term.
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