Nigeria will spend the extra revenue accruing from rising crude oil prices to fund infrastructural projects President Muhammadu Buhari has said.
While the 2018 budget proposal is benchmarked on $47 per barrel, crude prices have already rallied to more than $70 a barrel.
The extra funds “will be deployed to infrastructure projects like roads, rail, and power for the good of our people, and for the development of the country,’’ Mr Buhari said while receiving a delegation from oil giant, Eni, at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, Friday.
Describing the state of the downstream sector as “a disgraceful thing,” the President said “In my first coming, all our refineries were working. Port Harcourt used to refine 60,000 barrels per day, it was later upgraded to 100,000 barrels. Kaduna and Warri were also working optimally, and we used to satisfy the demand of the local market and equally exported 100,000 barrels of refined petrol. Now, no refinery is performing up to 50 percent.’’
Mr Antonio Vella, Chief Upstream Officer, Eni, Informed the President Buhari that Eni had presented a technical proposal to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to rehabilitate the Port Harcourt refinery, and also done a feasibility study on a new refinery of up to 150,000bpd capacity.
“There are other upstream initiatives, and a deep water project, with estimated expenditure of $13 billion,’’ Vella added.
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