TheCable

The Federal Executive Council (FEC) has approved the sum of $1.5 billion for the rehabilitation of Port Harcourt refinery in Rivers state.

The approval was announced on Wednesday, at the 38th virtual FEC meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari in Abuja.

Speaking with state house correspondents, Timipre Sylva, minister of state for petroleum, said the rehabilitation will be done in three phases of 18, 24 and 44 months.

He said the contract will be awarded to Tecnimont SPA, an Italian company.

Sylva said the funding has three components from Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) internally generated revenue (IGR), Afreximbank and budgetary provisions.

“The Ministry of Petroleum Resources presented a memo on the rehabilitation of Port Harcourt refinery for the sum of 1.5 billion, and that memo was $1.5 billion and it was approved by council today,” he said.

“So we are happy to announce that the rehabilitation of productivity refinery will commence in three phases. The first phase is to be completed in 18 months, which will take the refinery to a production of 90 percent of its nameplate capacity.

“The second phase is to be completed in 24 months and all the final stage will be completed in 44 months and consultations are approved.

“And I believe that this is good news for Nigeria.”

Sylva said discussions are in progress for the rehabilitation of other refineries, noting that “before the lifetime of this administration expires, work on all the refineries would have at least commenced”.

“As you know, there is a local content law. The Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB) is fully part of the contracting process and has safeguarded the interest, adequately of our local contractors, so our local people will be fully involved with the Tecnimont spa,” he said.