Daybreak, Politics, Entertainment, Sport

Tag: Mele Kyari

  • Mele Kyari Addresses Rumors of NNPC Headquarters Relocation from Abuja to Lagos

    Mele Kyari Addresses Rumors of NNPC Headquarters Relocation from Abuja to Lagos

    By Daniel Edu

    The Nigeria National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Ltd has officially denied any intentions of relocating its headquarters from Abuja to Lagos.

    During an investigative hearing on allegations of corrupt acquisition of OVH Energy by NNPC, the Group Chief Executive Officer, Mele Kyari, refuted the claims before an ad hoc committee of the House of Representatives.

    Kyari clarified that despite being a private company registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission, NNPC had no plans to shift its headquarters to Lagos. He explained that the misconceptions might arise from the fact that a significant portion, about 70 percent, of the company’s operations are conducted in Lagos.

    He further mentioned that NNPC Ltd had streamlined its operations and placed the right personnel where they were needed to function effectively. The official registered headquarters of NNPC Ltd remains in Abuja.

    Kyari emphasized that in any merger and acquisition process, it is essential to allow the dominant culture to take precedence, such as a commitment to service. This, he stressed, was precisely what NNPC Ltd was actively implementing.

    “Merger and acquisition come with challenges, but we are minimizing their impact to ensure the continued success of the business. We are taking every step to ensure that this transition has no adverse effects and, in fact, adds value to our operations,” Kyari stated.

  • Subsidy Removal Will Reduce Fuel Consumption By 30% – NNPC

    Subsidy Removal Will Reduce Fuel Consumption By 30% – NNPC

    The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) has disclosed that with the subsidy removal policy now being fully implemented, the volume of petrol consumed daily in Nigeria may drop by 30 per cent.

    The country has a history of unreliable fuel consumption data, even as the current figure is estimated to be currently between 66 million litres per day and 70 million litres per day. It is believed that many of the imported product is smuggled out of the country.

    Speaking on a live television programme, the Group Chief Executive Officer of the national oil company, Mallam Mele Kyari, admitted that Nigeria has no accurate data on fuel consumption, adding however, that the country knows the actual volume evacuated from the depots.

    “I don’t think there is any credible data on consumption, but there is credible data on evacuation from the depots. They are very distinct. So every truck that leaves the depots in this country is known – the truck number, the driver, and the destination of that product are known.
    “We have numbers around this and those numbers are what we assume is our consumption. But we know that this may not be our consumption figure because we know that petroleum products are smuggled across the country,” he stated.

    Kyari admitted that not all the petrol imported into Nigeria is consumed within the country, stressing that the arbitrage situation caused by the subsidy regime was to blame for the anomaly. “We’re actually subsidising everybody else in West Africa,” he added.
    Explaining that even those who secure the Nigerian borders are “not angels,” Kyari argued that there was a huge incentive to smuggle the fuel because the gains are enormous.

    Kyari also said that Nigeria’s neighbouring countries can now legitimately import fuel from Nigeria, rather than utilise the smuggling route.
    According to him, to take advantage of the situation, Nigeria will now convert smuggling to a legitimate market because the objective is to be the supplier to West Africa and the surroundings.

    “In a subsidy regime, in an arbitrage environment, which we have – wherever it is, you cannot eliminate fraud. Because it’s not possible.
    “What this action of taking subsidy off has done is that it will bring down the evacuation from the depot because even when you round-trip, you go across the border, it is the market price, and therefore there’ll be no incentive for that. And I believe that 30 per cent of the volume that we see today will probably vanish,” he added.

    Kyari lamented that it has been very difficult, if not practically impossible to transport petroleum products through the pipelines because of the activities of vandals around the country.
    He said at one point, the NNPC and partners were losing about 34 per cent of products pumped into the pipelines, a development he said was unsustainable.
    On the commencement of in-country refining by the NNPC, Kyari noted that it would only be possible from December, explaining that there were delays in bringing in equipment, which further extended the completion time of the refineries.

    He said the plan was to get all the refineries within the country to start working from the first half of next year to complement the Dangote refinery, which will make Nigeria a net exporter of petrol to West African countries.
    “It (Port Harcourt refinery) will come on stream by the end of the year. We had some supply chain issues, which is a global problem and I’ve explained this over and over.

    “There is a crisis in the global marine sector. Getting these things to location is a huge challenge and we have had some delays in the delivery of some of our equipment, but the equipment has arrived, work is in progress, and will deliver on this,” he said.
    The GCEO promised that by the end of July, Nigeria would be able to produce about 1.6 million barrels per day and thereafter hit the 1.8 million barrels per day allocated to the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) quota.

    He stated that the NNPC was working on the Atlas Cove facility and was proceeding to get back the line into Mosimi.
    Kyari stressed that it had become so bad that in the last 17 years, the NNPC had not been able to pump products from Warri to even Benin, Edo State.

  • NNPC To Resume Oil Search In Lake Chad Next Week – Kyari

    NNPC To Resume Oil Search In Lake Chad Next Week – Kyari

    Group Chief Executive Officer (GCEO) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC), Mele Kyari has said that they will resume oil search in Lake Chad next week.

    Kyari who made the announcement on Monday, May 15, during a courtesy visit to the Abuja headquarters of Media Trust Group (MTG), said oil search in the Lake Chad basin was stalled for over five years due to insurgency in the North East.

    He said the discovery of oil in viable commercial quantities in Kolmani River (upper Benue trough) between Gombe and Bauchi states last November gave positive signals for more efforts in Lake Chad.

    Kyari said;

    “It was the Kolmani that helped us to locate a position in Nasarawa State. It is the same reason that by next week, we’ll spud in another well in the Chad Basin. Mr President directed us over a year ago that we should go back to the Chad Basin and continue exploration work.

    “Security of our workers is the most important element of our work. We have assessed the environment and we know that substantial peace has been regained in the Chad Basin. Communities have returned to their locations and their villages. You do not hear of incidents and there is substantial containment of this.

    “And we’re also working very closely with the security agencies; the state government to make sure that staff are safe, our equipment are safe. I will have no doubt that the safety of our staff is assured and that’s why we are going back because there is relative safety in the location.”

    On the status of the discovered oil in Kolmani and the search in Ebenyi A, Kyari said;

    “Our first focus is to deliver the in situ refining experiment and when Mr President flagged off the Kolmani River well, we promised we will get it done in 36 months and we’ll deliver it. Our rig is drilling in Nasarawa and our team is on site, continuously working and we are very optimistic.”

  • Oil Production Rises To 1.6m bpd, Says Mele Kyari

    Oil Production Rises To 1.6m bpd, Says Mele Kyari

    The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) has confirmed that the country’s oil production has risen to 1.6 million barrels per day, a few millions short of the 1.8 million bpd quota allocated by the Oil Producing Countries Organisation (OPEC).

    Revealing this at a meeting of stakeholders in the oil and gas industry, called to discuss the challenges of crude oil theft and losses affecting the oil and gas industry, the Group Chief Executive Officer of NNPC, Mr Mele Kyari, said that the rectangular security approach, comprising NNPC and Partners, Regulators, Government Security Operators and the Communities, boosted by the adoption of technology, ensured the recovery of production from what it was in July 2022 to 1.67 million barrels per day.

    Kyari, who was represented by the NNPCL Chief Upstream Investment Officer, Bala Wunti, at the event chaired by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, said the implementation of the Detect, Deter, Destroy, and Recover (3D strategy), the establishment of the Central Command and Control Centre for effective monitoring and coordination, the launch of the Whistle-Blowers Portal and the Crude Oil Validation Portal as well as the deployment of some of the best-in-class surveillance tools and technology have been a game changer in the fight against crude oil theft and vandalism.

    The NNPCL boss stated that a key element of the collaboration has been the onboarding of the Private Security Contractors from the host communities, which were hitherto isolated.

    He said the security contractors’ in-depth knowledge of the terrain and modus operandi of the criminals have led to massive discoveries of illegal connections and interception of vessels ferrying stolen crude oil.

  • NNPC Confirms Oil Discovery in Nasarawa, To Start Drilling in March

    NNPC Confirms Oil Discovery in Nasarawa, To Start Drilling in March

    Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Limited has confirmed the discovery of oil in Nasarawa State.

    NNPC disclosed this in a series of tweets on Friday, after a visit to Kyari by the Governor of Nasarawa State, Abdullahi Sule, saying the official spud-in of first oil well in the state will commence in two months.

    “Group CEO @nnpclimited @MKKyari announced today that the official spud-in of first oil well in Nasarawa State will commence in March 2023. This, according to @MKKyari, is in continuation of hydrocarbon exploration activities in Nigeria’s inland basins.

    “@MKKyari disclosed this while receiving in audience a delegation of prominent Nasarawa State indegenes, led by the State Governor, Engr. Abdullahi Sule at the #NNPCTowers, Abuja, earlier today,” the corporation said.

    This comes less than two months after President Muhammadu Buhari flagged off the Kolmani Integrated Development Project in the North-East.

    Buhari said the oil exploration at the Kolmani River located between Gombe and Bauchi states had already attracted over $3bn foreign direct investment and will boost Nigeria’s fortunes and earnings.

    The project is expected to start with a daily production of about 50,000 barrels of crude oil.

    The President had flagged off the spud-In of Kolamani River II in February 2019 three years after he gave directives for the resumption of oil exploration in the northern part of the country.

  • How Onslaught Against Oil Thieves Boosted Daily Production – Mele Kyari

    How Onslaught Against Oil Thieves Boosted Daily Production – Mele Kyari

    The historic step taken by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) to launch an onslaught against oil theft which had ravaged oil production capacity is fast paying off as oil production has risen to 1.59 million barrels per day (bpd) in the first week of December from less than a million earlier.

    Through the provisions of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) 2021, NNPC Ltd transited from the defunct Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation to the new NNPC Limited and ready for increased profitability on behalf of the over 200 million Nigerians. However, this single quest has been hampered by massive oil theft, prompting the company to take a historic action.

    In the later part of this year, the Group Chief Executive Officer of NNPC Ltd, Malam Mele Kolo Kyari, launched the crude oil monitoring system and platform which, he said, is to enable citizens to contact the company on cases of suspected oil theft and vandalisation around oil communities.

    Kyari said, illegal activities around oil assets including illegal refineries, insertion on oil pipelines, among others have caused a huge shortfall in oil production with the situation getting worse this year. Before the onslaught against the oil thieves, Nigeria was estimated to be losing over 200,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil; cutting production capacity to just 1.1 million barrels per day (bpd) from a 1.8m bpd quota assigned to Nigeria by OPEC.

    One action from the NNPC Ltd was the engagement of a private surveillance firm, Tantita Security Services Nigeria Ltd managed by ex-agitator, Government Oweizide Ekpemupolo popularly called Tompolo, on August 13.

    The firm, which has its base in the Niger Delta, worked with security operatives to comb the areas and to the surprise of Nigerians, massive discoveries of illegal activities were made.

    It was revealed that over 68 vessels involved in crude oil theft have been arrested, while 638 illegal refineries out of 763 have been destroyed, as well as several arrests made.

    Beside Tompolo’s company, two other contractors were engaged in executing the pipeline surveillance activities to ward off oil thieves.

    “We have another contractor called Maton Engineering that is responsible for Brass and all the central areas and we have the pipeline infrastructure responsible for the East. So, there are three contractors based on the sectorisation of the region and each one of them is reporting.”

    As the NNPC Ltd’s feat got credence from Nigerians, the perpetrators devised means to frustrate the scheme. The GCEO of NNPC had in November revealed alleged threat to his life over his role in curtailing the theft of oil running into trillions of naira in the country.

    Speaking during a function in Abuja, Kyari said such threat would not dissuade him from embarking on the task of repositioning the oil and gas sector in the country as he justified the decision to engage the oil pipeline surveillance team to curtail the massive theft of oil in the country.

    Kyari said: “The scale of oil theft that we have seen was not anticipated, not expected, not thought of. The scale is enormous. We have seen pipelines taken from our main trunk lines into abandoned platforms in which people come to steal oil.

    “We have seen the thousands of illegal refineries that we have taken down in the last four to five months. We have seen up to 295 illegal connections to our pipelines and many of them have been there for years.

    “Companies would stop injecting oil if they discover it can’t get to the terminals,” the NNPC boss explained.

    On the implications of oil theft to the Nigerian economy, Kyari said: “From our records, before we recovered, we were losing 700,000bpd, translating to 21 million barrels per month, and if you consider an average price of this year at $90/barrel, that will translate to somewhere around $1.8bn or $1.9bn losses that we suffered.” 

  • How Crude Oil Thieves Used Technology To Lay Pipelines – Mele Kyari

    How Crude Oil Thieves Used Technology To Lay Pipelines – Mele Kyari

    The Group Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Ltd, Mallam Mele Kyari, has lamented the spate of oil theft in the country, saying those that engage in the act use technology to lay pipelines.

    Kyari, who spoke on Newsnight, a pre-recorded programme on Channels Television, said thieves succeeded in stealing the nation’s crude oil due to collaboration with government and security officials.

    Noting that collaboration within the system has aided crude oil theft for a while, the NNPC boss said the extent of such collaboration is unknown to the authorities.

    “When you introduce technology into stealing and this is precisely what they did and when there is a collaboration of people who should not be part of that transactions, you can lay pipelines and no one will see it,” he said.

    “You can do it in the night if you have the abilities and ultimately, this is what we think happened. You can lay pipelines for the wrong reasons to abandon or active assets. You will see end-to-end collaboration either by people who are around those assets, people operating the assets or people supposed to provide security.

    “You can eliminate anything. When you find collaborators in the system, then you can get anything done. We didn’t know because the extent of collaboration is unknown to us.”

    On the way forward, the NNPC boss noted that the government has stepped up efforts to tackling the scourge of crude oil thefts.

    One of the measures, he explained, is that the authorities backed by other stakeholders now have full surveillance of the nation’s oil infrastructure and are facing this challenge squarely.

    Kyari stated that the Federal Government has deployed helicopters for 24-hour surveillance to monitor and protect pipelines.

    Oil theft has become a malignant cancer in Nigeria for years with unimaginable volumes of oil being lifted by some cabals in the oil sector. Recently, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited said it uncovered an illegal oil connection from Forcados Terminal that operated for nine years with about 600,000 barrels per day of oil lost in the same period.

    Similarly, a former militant leader, Government Ekpemepulo, popularly known as Tompolo, said about 58 illegal oil points have been discovered so far since the operation to end oil theft on the waterways of Delta and Bayelsa states began.

  • Subsidy Responsible For Oil Theft — Mele Kyari

    Subsidy Responsible For Oil Theft — Mele Kyari

    The Group Managing Director of NNPC Limited, Mele Kyari has blamed petroleum subsidy for the high rate of smuggling of the products across the border.

    Mr Kyari, while speaking at a summit organized by the House of Representatives Committee on Anti-Corruption, said as long as there is subsidy, smuggling and round-tripping will persist.

    He stated that NNPC Limited cannot be held accountable for the matter.

    “As long as arbitrage is there, you will continue to have these issues and you cannot hold NNPC accountable for it because it is a value chain that involves everything and everybody,” he said.

    He also revealed that there are threats to his life by those who are opposed to changes caused by the implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act.

    “There is threat to life, I can say this, I have several death threats but we are not bothered about this, we believe that no one dies unless it is his time.

    But this is the cost of change, when people move away from what they are used to something that is new that will take away value and benefit from them, they will react,” he said.

  • Oil Thieves Threatening my Life – Mele Kyari Raises Alarm

    Oil Thieves Threatening my Life – Mele Kyari Raises Alarm

    Group Managing Director of the NNPC Limited, Mele Kyari, said as a result of the several ongoing reforms in the oil and gas sector leading to the discovery of several sources of crude oil theft, he has been receiving death threats from unknown persons.

    Kyari spoke just as the Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related Offences Commission (ICPC) Prof Bolaji Owasanoye said the country was losing about 60 percent of revenue to bad agreements.

    Kyari said the Company has discovered and destroyed thousands of illegal refineries in the last few months as well as connection on the main pipeline carrying crude to the terminal for export, dismissing the threat to his life as a none issue because “every human being will die someday”.

    They spoke at a one day Legislative Transparency and Accountability Summit organised by the House of Representatives Committee on Anti-Corruption.

    He said while the country is losing about 700,000 barrel of crude daily, it is not all the crude lost that is as a result of activities of oil bunkers, adding some oil companies sometimes refuse to pump crude into the export line when they discover that such crude does not get to the export terminal.

    He said the NNPC decided to use the services of private security firms to police the pipelines, adding that working in collaboration with other security agencies, they have recorded a lot of achievement.

  • Stolen Oil Seen Mostly In Churches, Mosques – NNPC Boss

    Stolen Oil Seen Mostly In Churches, Mosques – NNPC Boss

    The Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited, has accused government officials, religious leaders, security agencies and even some staff of the nation’s crude oil theft.

    Speaking during the 49th session of the weekly ministerial briefly at the State House in Abuja, NNPC Group Chief Executive Officer, Mele Kyari maintained that the menace involves every member of the society.

    He stated that wherever the stolen product is found mostly in churches and mosques, there has been a network of vandals working in collaboration.

    “When a fire outbreak happened in one of our pipelines, we discovered that some of the pipelines were actually connected to individuals’ homes. And not only that, and with all sensitivity to our religious beliefs, you know, some of the pipelines and some of the products that we found, are actually in churches and in mosques,” Kyari said.

    “That means that everybody is involved. There is no way you will take products, bring them in trucks in populated neighborhoods, load them, and leave without everybody else knowing about it. Everybody includes members of the community, members of the religious leaders and also and most likely government officials of all natures, including security agencies personnel.

    “They are everywhere. And I’ve seen this even in the Niger Delta. There’s no way you would deliver a volume and lose up to 30 percent and you will continue to put those products in this line.”

    For this reason, the NNPC boss disclosed that the entire network of pipelines for petroleum products distribution in the country has been shut down, as a result of the activities of vandals.

    To further address the menace, the Group CEO announced that a national reserve company will be established to manage the pipelines on a commercial basis to efficiently put them to use for the distribution of products across the country.

    According to him, crude oil theft which has resulted in the discovery of 295 illegal connections making it difficult for oil companies to operate efficiently has been very difficult to manage but they are not helpless.

    He guaranteed that fully embracing the gas infrastructure will resolve the nation’s energy poverty.