Home / Business and Economy / Reps committe commends $18bn Dangote refinery, promises to deepen implementation of local content law
Alhaji Aliko Dangote

Reps committe commends $18bn Dangote refinery, promises to deepen implementation of local content law

Alhaji Aliko Dangote
By Yunus Yusuf
Mr Emmanuel Elon, the Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Local Content, on Wednesday commended Dangote for its huge investment on the refinery and petrochemical industry.

He said that the refinery would improve the socio-economic development of the nation.

Ekon gave the commendation during the oversight visit of the committee to Dangote refinery and petrochemicals in Lekki Free Trade Zone in Ibeju Lekki, Lagos.

Ekon assured Dangote of lawmakers’ support to indigenous companies, while also promising to create enabling environment for businesses in Nigeria to thrive.

According to him, “we are going to work with the management of Dangote to ensure that local content implementation is deepened.

“We commend Dangote multi-billion dollars investments in the refinery and his vision for the growth of the country.

“We urge others to imbibed the giant strides taken by Dangote in the oil and gas industry,” he said.

Ekon said that the National Assembly would provide adequate legislation to deepen the implementation of the local content law in the oil and gas sector.

He said that this was necessary to change the outlook of the nation’s oil and gas industry.

The lawmaker said that the local content law would be beneficial to all Nigerians if implemented appropriately.

“Local content has the capacity to turn around the fortunes of Nigeria for good.

“It has the capacity of transforming our economy to any level that we want to, but again the implementation lies with us all.

“We must realise that Nigeria is our country. We do not have any other country to call our own.

“Local content implementation is something every Nigerian must vigorously pursue.

“If it works, it will be good for all of us; it will be good for our children and even the yet unborn,” he said.

Mr Babajide Soyode, the Technical Consultant to Alhaji Aliko Dangote, said that the refinery would save the country over 12 billion dollars annually through import substitution.

According to him, the project will add value to the economy as all the projects will be creating about 4,000 direct and 145,000 indirect jobs.

Soyode lauded the resolve of the lawmakers towards supporting indigenous companies.

He said that Dangote was committed to local content development. “As you are aware, we are currently building the world’s largest single line Refinery, Petrochemical Complex and the world’s second largest Urea Fertiliser plant.

“The refinery will have the capacity to refine 650,000 barrels of crude oil per day while the petrochemical plant will produce 780 KTPA Polypropylene, 500 KTPA of Polyethylene while the fertiliser project will produce 3.0 million metric tonnes per annum of Urea.”

Soyode said that the company would also build the largest sub-sea pipeline infrastructure in any country in the world, with a length of 1,100km, to handle three billion SCF of gas per day.

The plant, according to him, will generate over 100,000 employment opportunities and revive over 11,000 filling stations that had been shut due to shortage of products.

He said that the refinery would lower the price of petroleum products in Nigeria and save some costs on importation.

Soyode urged the Federal Government to pursue the diversification programme to wean Nigeria from heavy reliance on crude oil export.

According to him, the best way to diversify the economy is through agriculture and “our fertiliser plant is in line with that goal”.

“By the time we finish our gas pipeline, it can generate about 12,000mw and we can export gas to other African countries.

“We would have the capacity to store four billion litres of products and can load 2,680 trucks per day.”

“This is the single largest refinery in the world. The petrochemical that we have is 13 times bigger than the Eleme Petrochemical built by the government,” soyode said.

About Global Patriot Staff

Check Also

CBN unveils new minimum capital requirements for banks …Gives banks 24 months to recapitalise

ABUJA Days after urging Nigerian banks to expedite action on the recapitalisation of their capital …

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *