Dangote Refinery currently under construction would save Nigeria $12 billion annual import substitution, create 4,000 direct jobs and crash prices of petroleum products.

Mr Babajide Soyode, the Technical Consultant to Alhaji Aliko Dangote, said the project would add value to the economy as it would also create 145,000 indirect jobs.

He said that the refinery would lower the prices of petroleum products in Nigeria and save some costs on importation.

“The refinery will have the capacity to refine 650,000 barrels of crude oil per day while the petrochemical plant will produce 780 KTPA Polypropylene, 500 KTPA of Polyethylene while the fertiliser project will produce 3.0 million metric tonnes per annum of Urea.”

Soyode made the submission on Wednesday when the House of Representatives Committee on Local Content paid an oversight visit to Dangote refinery and petrochemicals in Lekki Free Trade Zone in Ibeju Lekki, Lagos.

Lauded the lawmakers for supporting indigenous companies, Soyode said that Dangote was committed to local content development.

“As you are aware, we are currently building the world’s largest single line Refinery, Petrochemical Complex and the world’s second largest Urea Fertiliser plant.”

Soyode said that the company would also build the largest sub-sea pipeline infrastructure in any country in the world, with a length of 1,100km, to handle three billion SCF of gas per day.

The plant, according to him, will generate over 100,000 employment opportunities and revive over 11,000 filling stations that had been shut due to shortage of products.

Soyode urged the Federal Government to pursue the diversification programme to wean Nigeria from heavy reliance on crude oil export.

According to him, the best way to diversify the economy is through agriculture and “our fertiliser plant is in line with that goal.”

“By the time we finish out gas pipeline, it can generate about 12,000mw and we can export gas to other African countries.

“We would have the capacity to store four billion litres of products and can load 2,680 trucks per day.”

“This is the single largest refinery in the world. The petrochemical that we have is 13 times bigger than the Eleme Petrochemical built by the government,” soyode TTNAN)

Mr Emmanuel Ekon, the Chairman of the Committee on Local Content commended Dangote for the huge investment on the refinery and petrochemical industry.

He said that the refinery would improve socio-economic development of the nation.

He assured Dangote of lawmakers’ support to indigenous companies, while also promising to create enabling environment for businesses in Nigeria to thrive.

“We are going to work with the management of Dangote to ensure that local content implementation is deepened.

“We commend Dangote multi-billion dollars investments in the refinery and his vision for the growth of the country.

“We urged others to imbibed the giant strive taken by Dangote in the oil and gas industry,” he said.

Ekon said that the National Assembly would provide adequate legislation to deepen the implementation of the local content law in the oil and gas sector.

He said that this was necessary to change the outlook of the nation’s oil and gas industry.

The lawmaker said that the local content law would be beneficial to all Nigerians if implemented appropriately.

“Local content has the capacity to turn around the fortunes of Nigeria for good.

“It has the capacity of transforming our economy to any level that we want to, but again the implementation lies with us all.

“We must realise that Nigeria is our country. We do not have any other country to call our own.” (NAN)

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