By Abiola Olawale
The Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi II has backed the Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of Dangote Industries Limited, Alhaji Aliko Dangote in his battle with some top officials in the oil and gas sector of Nigeria, especially the top management of the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited(NNPCL).
The monarch who called on the Federal Government to protect Dangote, by all means, said some officials of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) are fighting back because of the financial gains they are enjoying from the importation of petroleum products.
Sanusi, a former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) also accused the NNPCL of running the refineries in Nigeria aground and creating a false impression that the country can only depend on imported petroleum products.
He argued that NNPCL has no moral right to accuse Dangote of trying to monopolize the economic sector when it could just turn around the refineries in Nigeria.
He said: “This is most laughable. On the contrary, relying on a local refinery is far more secure than these imports.
“It is a very rich argument from an entity that had taken billions of dollars in the name of turnaround maintenance and not produced a drop of product from four refineries because it is more profitable to continue extracting rent in the name of subsidy. If NNPC activated its refineries, there would be no monopoly. Then, we can see the sulphur content of its products and compare them to Dangote’s.
“Until then, keeping quiet is the honourable option for it, NNPC and its spinoffs have lost any right to talk until they fix the mess they have thrown us into.
“In any case, if the Dangote refinery is unable to meet local demand, the gap can be filled by imports, these people in NNPC do not want to end their lucrative subsidy scam, and I don’t think they will end it.
”But as a nation, if we do not thank Dangote for what he has done as an African to deal a hammer blow to multinationals and the rentier system and for structural change in this economy through value added in various sectors, we should not condemn him.
“Also, we tend to repeat stories without evidence. We hear about Dangote getting favourable taxation but no one has said what this tax is, if he got it alone if it was offered to a sector or pioneers, and if such a practice is normal to encourage investment.
“Instead of killing Dangote, we should try and make more like him. Nigeria always kills its heroes and its best because of envy and pettiness.”
The Monrch’s comments are coming amid the recent public battle of words between the Dangote Refinery and the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) over alleged substandard petroleum products.
It would be recalled that the Chief executive of the NMDPRA, Farouk Ahmed had claimed that the diesel from Dangote’s plant contained high levels of sulphur, harmful to engines and the environment.
Ahmed had also said that Nigeria cannot depend on products from the Dangote refinery, revealing that products from the 650,000 barrels refinery are inferior and substandard in quality.
In response, Dangote invited members of the House of Representatives on a tour of the refinery to witness lab tests and make a comparison between the sulphur content of its diesel with imported samples.
According to Dangote, the tests revealed that Dangote’s diesel had a sulphur content of 87.6 ppm, significantly lower than the imported samples, which had levels exceeding 1800 ppm and 2000 ppm.
Dangote explained that the result does not only show the reality of products from his refinery, but it also shows that substandard petroleum products are being imported into the country and sold to unsuspecting Nigerians.
