Kachikwu Canvasses Fuel Subsidy Removal …As FG Slams $1.1bn Suit Against Shell, Eni

Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Mr. Ibe Kachikwu, yesterday, stated that until the downstream sector of the Nigerian petroleum industry is liberalised and subsidy of petroleum products removed, the country would continue to struggle and face challenges in terms of ensuring stable fuel supply.
Speaking in Abuja, at the presentation of the key achievements of the Ministry of Petroleum Resources in three years, 2016 to 2018 and award to staff of the ministry, Kachikwu argued that to address fuel supply challenges, the country needed to find a way to satisfy the need to provide products sufficiently for the populace and at the same time to be able to free the sector for growth.
be able to free the sector for growth. He said, “In the midstream and downstream sectors, we have struggled. I would love to see a day when there would be no fuel scarcity in this country. But for that to happen, there are certain realities. The liberalization of the sector is going to be a panacea to being able to solve this. As long as we continue to subsidise products, create market-unfriendly type practices, we would continue to struggle.
“We are not going to trade our way out of the fuel crisis by bringing sufficiency, by expanding reserves, by extravagant costs which cost the country a lot of money; that is not the solution. The solution is to get our refineries working.”
Kachikwu noted that investments are lacking in the petroleum sector, adding that over the years, refineries’ turn around maintenance, TAM, had been fraught with faulty models which had hampered the effectiveness of the refineries.
Meanwhile, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr Ibe Kachikwu, says the Federal Government is targeting to grow the crude oil production to 2.2 million barrels per day (mbpd) by the end of January, 2019.
Kachikwu made the disclosure during the presentation of the ministry’s achievements in three years (2016 to 2018) and awards to staff in Abuja yesterday.
He said that by the end of 2019, crude oil output would have hit 2.5 million barrels based on the coming on stream of the Egina field and the recently approved 30 field works which had the capability of increasing Nigeria’s output by 500,000 barrels per day.
“Crude oil production had been sustained at a fairly large level. We started at 800,000 barrels and we have grown it to about two million barrels.
“We should be doing more but for the cyclical difficulties in terms of occasional pipeline disruptions and occasional closure for purpose of maintenance.
“We are averaging about two million barrels and about 300,000 of that are roughly condensates.
“Really, by the end of January 2019, we should have grown production to about 2.2 million barrels which have been our signpost.
“In addition to that, there are 30 other field works that have been approved by the Department of Petroleum Resources, which have the capacity of adding about 500,000 barrels per day production,’’ he said
According to Kachikwu, by the end of 2019, the country will be averaging 2.5 million barrels production, which will be the first time it will be done in the country.
The minister said that the oil reserves had been grown by over 600 million barrels, rising from 36.18 million barrels to 37.2 million barrels.
He noted that government had been able to grow the gas reserves from 192 trillion cubic feet to 199.09 trillion cubic feet of gas in two years.
Kachikwu said: “We discovered so many new fields, like Owowo. We have been able to grow rig activity in the country.
“ When we assumed office, the rig activity in the country was about two to three rigs that were operating in Nigeria at the time.
“As at 2017, we had about 21 rigs in operation, up from about 16 rigs in operation in 2016.
“Hopefully, with the big FPSOs, it is beginning to look as if there are possibilities in Nigeria. We expect to see a lot more rig activity in Nigeria.’’
In another development,the Nigerian government is taking oil giants Shell and Eni to court in London, requesting the return of $1.1 billion (969 million euros) as part of a case of alleged corruption dating back to 2011, Bloomberg reported yesterday.
FG alleges that the money was used by the companies to buy an oil exploration licence in the Gulf of Guinea but was diverted to bribes and kickbacks, the report said.
The government alleges that Shell and Eni were partly responsible for the fact that “corrupt Nigerian officials” used the money for personal enrichment, it added.
The alleged corruption is already the subject of a separate court case in Milan in which Nigeria is a civil party. Shell and Eni have always denied any unlawful action.
In a statement yesterday, a Shell spokesman said that the deal in 2011 was “a fully legal transaction with Eni and the Federal Government of Nigeria”.