LAGOS:The President of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, has presented the first sample of Premium Motor Spirit, otherwise known as petrol.
Dangote made this presentation on Tuesday in a live broadcast from his 650,000 per daily capacity refinery facility situated in the Ibeju-Lekki Area of Lagos State.
This is coming after over a year of its launch in May 2023 by the former president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Mohammed Buhari.
At a press conference, owner of the Lagos-based refinery and billionaire businessman Aliko Dangote declared that “it’s a celebration day” for Nigerians.
In his statement, He assured all citizens that they “are now going to have good petrol while the engines of your vehicles will last longer. You will not be having an engine issue, which a lot of us were having. It won’t happen at all.”
Read other related news: September launch: Dangote refinery and Tinubu panel discuss fuel prices
- We Are Ready To Start Selling Fuel-Dangote Refinery
- Sell Crude Oil To Dangote Refinery In Naira, Tinubu Tells NNPCL
- Dangote, Local Refineries Wiill End NNPCL Fuel Importation
- Fuel Subsidy: Marketers project N707 billion monthly
“The quality here will match that of anywhere in the world; America and other parts of the world. We will make sure that nobody will beat us in terms of quality,” Dangote said.
The business magnate also stated that once his company finalizes arrangements with the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), their product will be available in the market. “Once we finalize the agreement with NNPCL, our product will start being distributed,” he said.
“We aim to rejuvenate the industry and manufacturing sector. Our goal is to implement genuine import substitution, which will conserve foreign exchange, generate revenue, stabilize the naira, and help reduce inflation and the cost of living,” explained Africa’s richest individual.
In December of last year, Aliko Dangote, Africa’s top industrialist, launched operations at his $20 billion facility in Lagos, which has a capacity of 350,000 barrels per day.
Despite initial regulatory challenges, the refinery is on track to reach its full capacity of 650,000 barrels per day by year-end. The refinery has already started supplying diesel, aviation fuel, and now petrol to marketers across the country
The NNPCL’s admit that it owes “significant debt to petrol suppliers” and that this poses a danger to the sustainability of fuel supply which coincided with the Dangote Refinery’s launch of petrol.
According to sources, the $6 billion debt that the NNPCL owes fuel suppliers is contributing to Nigeria’s current petrol shortage—which has been since the beginning of 2024 made it worse.
At various points in time, the NNPCL justified the shortage of what was required to factors such as flooding and logistical challenges.
However, NNPCL spokesman Olufemi Soneye said in a statement on Sunday that “the company has been under immense stress due to this financial strain, which also poses a threat to the sustainability of fuel supply.”
Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, has energy issues, with Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, has energy shortages because none of its state-owned refineries are now in use.
The state-owned NNPC is the main importer of the necessary goods, and the nation is mostly dependent on imported refined petroleum products.
In the nation, lines for fuel are not uncommon. Due to the decades-long epileptic electrical supply, the cost of gasoline has tripled since the termination of subsidies in May 2023, from approximately ₦200/litre to roughly ₦800/litre. This has made matters worse for the citizens who rely on gasoline to power their cars and generators.
The naira’s value plummeted from $1/₦700 to over $1/₦1600 at the parallel market when the government unified the FX windows at the same time. Food and basic commodity prices skyrocketed right away as Nigerians struggled with accompanying inflation
