THE Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited needs to roll out massive investments in terms of oil and gas to meet the demand for these commodities, Africa’s richest man and Chairman, Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, has said.
He said the national oil firm should invest more because there were many off-takers waiting to off-take the products from the company.
Dangote spoke at the ongoing 2023 Annual Value Assurance Review Workshop of the Nigeria Upstream Investment Management Services Limited, according to a statement.
He explained that a good investment manager would actively seek for investment opportunities, assess them and take shrewd investment decisions.
He further stated that the NNPCL could generate billions of dollars in revenue if the right decisions were made, as the Petroleum Insustry Act had brought the transformation of the oil firm from a government establishment to a commercial entity with no recourse to government funding.
He was quoted as saying, “I truly believe that NNPCL should be our African Aramco. You have what it takes to take you up there and I am very happy. There is nothing that is impossible. You can make it possible and don’t let anything scare you.
“It is just the same thing with us. If I tell you about our own story, you will be shocked as to how. It wasn’t only the refinery that we started about six years ago. We had 32 projects that we all rolled out at the same time.
“But then, on the way we had lots of hitches here and there, the devaluation of the currency, COVID, and challenges of infrastructure set in. If you want to do a real project in Nigeria, you have to look at the infrastructure that we have, because the infrastructure we have is not meant for mega projects.”
He said it was important to to look at the infrastructure in Nigeria and see “how we can take ourselves to the next level and it has to be driven by NNPCL because they are the largest conglomerate and whatever happens to NNPCL’s assets, it actually happens to us, either directly or indirectly.”
Also speaking at the event, the Chairman, Heirs Holding, Tony Elumelu, said efforts made by NNPCL in restoring Nigeria’s oil production impacted positively on the output of Heirs Oil and Gas.
The Group Chief Executive Officer, NNPCL, Mele Kyari, said the challenges confronting the oil and gas industry globally had made it compelling for the oil company to come up with more ingenious ways of doing things.
He admitted that there had been challenges with security and underinvestment in recent times, but noted that with the passage of the Petroleum Industry Act, NNPCL was more better positioned to create value for Nigerians.
“The crux of the industry is to make sure the upstream industry works. If the upstream works, there would be cash in the country. We are in cash crunch in the country today, we are in forex crunch today because the upstream has not gotten to a level where we can have surplus to support the economy,” Kyari stated.