The Managing Director of Port Harcourt Refining Company Limited (PHRC), Dr. Bafred Enjugu, has said Nigerians have the capacity to run the four refineries without privatising them.
He added that it calls for perseverance.
Enjugu described as a welcome development, the 650,000 barrels per day Dangote Refinery in Lagos, stressing it was the most viable competition in the country.
He said yesterday in Port Harcourt at PHRC’s media roundtable that the refinery had been producing petroleum products of superior quality.
The managing director said the two refineries in Port Harcourt and the ones in Warri and Kaduna were running.
He said: “We are doing 60 per cent in PHRC, but we can go up to 105 per cent if we have crude. We are dogged to put things right.
“N1.3 trillion yearly can be made in PHRC, if it is running at 100 per cent capacity, which is very significant. It is a goldmine. PHRC made N2.95 billion in December, but Turn Around Maintenance (TAM) must be done every 26 months.”
Enjugu said the four refineries were producing kerosene, stressing that market forces should be blamed for the scarcity.
He said he did not support modular refineries, which he described as “toy”, of less than 160.000 barrels per day.
The Manager, Public Affairs Department (PAD) of PHRC, Mrs. Edith Johnson, said the media workshop was to build mutual trust and ensure accurate reporting.
Resource persons at the roundtable were PHRC’s managers: Oladele Jim-Owah, an engineer and Mrs. Ijeoma Obialor.