The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) Tuesday said it would eliminate the importation of petroleum products by the middle of 2023.

Group Chief Executive Officer of NNPC Limited Mele Kyari stated this at the weekly ministerial briefing organised by the Presidential Communications Team.

He said with the new measures being put in place, the company would meet up with the oil needs of Nigerians and even some countries.

“Even if all our four refineries in three locations are completed at 90 percent of installed capacity, they will only be able to raise 18 million litres of petroleum motor spirit (PMS) or petrol. That means that even if all of them are working today, we will still have a net deficit of PMS imported to this country.

“This is what it means; because our population has grown, demand has grown and the middle class has grown, such that the volume of PMS required in this country has grown exponentially.

“Certainly, if they all come back, we will still need to do more and happily also, NNPC owns 20 percent equity in the Dangote Refinery and we are very proud of this.

“Not just that, we have the right of first refusal to supply crude oil to that plant because we saw this energy transition challenge coming. We knew that a time will come when you will look for people who will buy your crude oil, you will not find it. And that means that we have locked down the ability to sell crude oil for 300, 000 barrels minimum by right for the next 20 years.

“Also, by right, we have access to 20 percent of the production from that plant as a part of our equity. So, this refinery comes on stream by latest the middle of next year. If it does, because it has the capacity to produce 650, 000 per barrel capacity and a different technology, it can crack the crude in a manner that you will have more gasoline than a typical refinery.

“That refinery has the ability to produce 50 million litres of PMS per day. So, a combination of that and our own ability to bring back our refineries will completely eliminate the importation of petroleum products into this country next year. You will not see any importation into this country next year. This is very practical, this is very possible,” he said.

He said work had reached an advanced stage on the resuscitation of the country’s refineries to enable them operate at optimal level.

“Our refineries are not functioning. We deliberately shut them down because it didn’t make any sense for you to take in for example $100 oil into the refineries and the product it brings out is $70.

“This is because of many reasons that border on very many years of neglect that have crystallised into the inability of these plants to perform optimally.

“It is still lamentations. We are not absolving ourselves from that responsibility or liability. It is real. What is very obvious is that this company wasn’t operating as a business for some reasons.

“Overall, we ended up having a situation where we were unable to make them process optimally and we shut them down. But now, we are very confident that we are restoring them back to at least 90 percent of their installed capacities. We will get them back to normalcy and run them as a business,” the GMD further said.