Oil Workers Oppose Sale of Refineries, Says It's against National Interest

Oil workers under the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) and the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) have said that they would resist federal government’s plan to sale the nation’s refineries.

Diezani Alison-Madueke, Petroleum minister had said two weeks ago that the nation’s four refineries would be put up for sale by the first quarter of next year.

But the two trade unions in the oil sector said their opposition to the sale of the refineries is premised on the fact that it is against national interest and that the country would not benefit from the exercise.

Echoing the stand of the oil workers in Lagos, Comrade Babatunde Ogun, PENGASSAN President, said the sale is only meant to reward government’s cronies.

He said the government deliberately underfunded the refineries and refused to carry out Turn-Around Maintenance (TAM) and supply crude to the refineries so as to have reasons for selling them off to their cronies.

He explained that instead of opting for the outright sale of the refineries, the federal government should adopt a modified process tailored towards the Nigerian Liquified Natural Gas (NLNG) model with the National Oil Company (NOC) as owners of the four refineries holding a substantial minority shares, while core investors/local participation holds the working majority with the staff, trade unions, and the host communities holding minority shares.

 He advised that government should deal with the problem of vandalism of pipelines that hamper supply of crude oil to the refineries as well as carry out TAM and see if the refineries will work or not.

Comrade Ogun said: “The proposed sale of the refineries is against the overall national interest but in the interest of a few, who are lurking around the corridors of power to milk the country dry. How can a country be selling all its national assets all in the name of privatisation? For whose benefit are such sales?

“If you recall, late President Yar’adua reversed the privatisation of the refineries done by former President Obasanjo, with a promise to carry out Turn-Around Maintenance (TAM) on them to ensure that they are sold not as scrap. On assumption to office, President Goodluck Jonathan also promised to carry out TAM on the refineries.

“Even the controversial Kalu Idika Kalu-led National Refineries Special Task Force also has TAM or rehabilitation of the refineries to make them work in a safe and reliable manner as part of its recommendations.  As we are talking now, nothing has been significantly done.

“Why is the government proposing sales of these national edifices without doing the needful to ensure that the refineries work at their optimal capacity? Nigerians and the general public deserve to know more on the desperate reasons for the spate and row of proposed privatisation, even when the selfish motives of these proposed national assets sales can spell doom for the country.” 

He also said the refineries should be entities independent of either the current Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) or the proposed NOC as in the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB), while the board of management of each refining company should be fully responsible for its success and failure.

Comrade Ogun said that those that are planning to sell the refineries and their cronies planning to buy them should emulate Alhaji Aliko Dangote and establish their own refineries instead of waiting to corner the nation’s common investment for their selfish interest.

He also stated that instead of privatising the refineries, government should grant effective incentives to allow for the development of private refineries alongside the existing ones, adding that a framework should be articulated that will make available required crude for effective functioning of local refineries. 

“There is need to incentivize and/or compel IOCs to refine an agreed percentage of crude oil in the country. A suggestion is to tie upstream licensing to downstream investment and private ownerships of jetties should be encouraged,” he said.

Ogun stated that: “As the privatisation trend continues, the Nigerian public will need to know from the process drivers the number of jobs and investment that have been created as against the reality that some cronies are now being recruited as technical partners to front for the high and mighty as was the case with Eleme Petrochemicals Company Limited which the government sold to Indorama for $225 million, a mega plant that is the second largest in Africa which at the time of its sale was worth about $2.5 billion as fair market value.

“Also at the time of the sale, the company was fully stocked and the materials needed for its TAM were being bought by the government. It only required working capital that was persistently blocked by bureaucratic bottleneck and undue government interference that delayed its efficiency.”