December 18, 2024 4:46 pmthe Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited invested $1 billion to support the plant’s construction.
But in a statement on Wednesday, Anthony Chiejina, group chief branding and communications officer of the Dangote Group,“We would like to clarify that this is a misrepresentation of the situation as $1bn is just about 5% of the investment that went into building the Dangote Refinery,” Chiejina said.
“If we were struggling with liquidity challenges we wouldn’t have given them such generous payment terms. As at 2021 when the agreement was signed, the refinery was at the pre-commission stage.”Chiejina said the agreement would have been cash-based rather than credit-driven if the refinery struggled with liquidity issues.He also said the NNPC was subsequently unable to supply the agreed 300,000 barrels a day of crude .
“NNPCL failed to meet this deadline which expired on June 30th 2024. As a result, their equity share was revised down to 7.24%. These events have been widely reported by both parties.”