Aliko Dangote says there will be no more importation of petrol into the country once his refinery is ready

Aliko Dangote, president of Dangote Group, has

assured Nigerians that when his refinery is
ready, the country would no longer need to
import petroleum products. Speaking at the site
of his refinery in Lekki, Dangote said his
refinery would put an end to fertiliser
importation in Nigeria, transforming the country
into a net exporter of refined crude and
fertilizer.
“Today, Nigeria imports 100 percent of its
fertilizer, but when we finish, Nigeria will be the
largest exporter of Urea and Ammonia in
Africa,” Dangote said. “The refinery is the
largest single line in Africa and it will meet our
total domestic requirement and save foreign
exchange.
“Thirty-eight per cent of CBN’s foreign
exchange is spent on importation of petroleum
products. But we can serve the whole West
African market.” Dangote said he had been
working with the government and the central
bank of Nigeria (CBN) in diversifying the
economy.
“We are going to serve the whole domestic
market in the next 10 years and also export. We
have actually been doing this for a very long
time to diversify the economy. “The government
will lay down the policies. The CBN will assist in
terms of long-term funding through the banks
and even directly now because they have
actually helped us quite a lot.
That is what we are now trying to do.” Godwin
Emefiele, the CBN governor, who visited the
Dangote free trade zone, said the CBN would
provide the needed foreign exchange for the
refinery, adding that the refinery, upon
completion, would generate $6 billion dollars in
foreign exchange for Nigeria. “Imagine what
would happen to the savings in foreign
exchange by the time the fertilizer plant is
completed in 2017 and by the time the refinery
and petrochemical plant is completed during
the early part of 2018.
“We expect that by the time these projects are
completed, they will not only meet the needs of
our domestic requirements – by the time they
are completed, he (Dangote) will be exporting
these products to the point where he will be
selling foreign exchange to Nigerians and CBN
to the tune of almost $6 billion yearly.
“That is the kind of project we think we should
support and we think that we need to
encourage more Nigerians to begin to think like
Aliko Dangote.” The Organisation of Petroleum
Exporting Countries (OPEC), in its world oil
outlook for 2015 said Dangote is responsible for
nearly 50 percent of refinery projects in Africa
for the next five years. The refinery is expected
to cost about N2.8 trillion and refine about
650,000 barrels of crude oil per day.