SPENDING N100 Billion ON ‘DEAD’ REFINERIES IS A HISTORICAL CRIMES AGAINST NIGERIANS- HURIWA:

Leading Civil Rights Advocacy group:- HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA (HURIWA) has described as an unmitigated assault to our collective civility and intelligence, the claim by NNPC that is spent N100 Billion to overhaul Nigeria’s crude refineries in 2021 that could not refine even a bottle of petrol.
HURIWA said it is inexplicable and indeed amounts to one of the wonders of the World that the government is claiming to be injecting multibillion maintenance costs to sustain the four near-moribund refineries in the Country whereas ordinary Nigerians with no licences to refine crude oil are all over Rivers and Niger Delta States running successful refineries that are Refining crude products illegally. 
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is therefore called upon, if it is not captured by forces behind the worst historical heist of Nigeria’s commonwealth, to immediately open transparent, open and fool-proof investigation into the financial transactions of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation as it pertains to the near-Moribund refineries that are now cash cows for reactionaries embedded in the federal government. HURIWA said the deliberate mischief by government officials to force down our throats the illogical claims of such a humongous expenditure on overhauling dead refineries is an attempt to rouse tensions in the society and to force Nigerians to pour out on the streets. 
“it is unfortunate that the political elites in Abuja who since the last six and half years unleashed half-baked economic voodoo policies aimed at mass impoverishment of millions of Nigerians, have mistaken the docility and silence of millions of Nigerians in the face of provocative official heists and corruption, for idiocy of the majority.”
“We are warning these over-fed government officials to stop thinking that Nigerians cannot demand accountability and transparency and therefore they are throwing all kinds of roguish financial reports on our faces believing that they are beyond reproach or that they are sacred cows. Let these officials respect the constitution and render proper account to stop the imminent unrests that may follow sooner than expected.”
HURIWA in a statement by Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National media Affairs Director Miss Zainab Yusuf, is hereby demanding full disclosures by the hierarchy of NNPC or by whatever name it is now called because the Rights group believes that even in fool’s paradise, government can’t spend or even rationally imagined that it expended a whooping sum of N100 Billion to overhaul refineries with no capacity to refine crude to give Nigerians even a ‘coca-cola’ bottle of fuel the whole of the year 2021.
HURIWA recalled that the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited reportedly spent N100 billion on the rehabilitation of the nation’s refineries in 2021.
 
The details are contained in the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) presentation to the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) meeting on its funding performance for the year.
 
According to the state oil firm, the fund was used to revamp the facilities throughout the year.
 
Although the specific refineries were not stated, according to the funding report, NNPC said it spent N8.3 billion every month in 2021 to revamp the refineries.
 
The facilities under the NNPC’s management include the Port Harcourt Refining Company (PHRC), Kaduna Refining Production Company (KRPC) and the Warri Refining Production Company (WRPC).
 
The refineries have a combined installed capacity of 445,000 barrels of oil per day.
 
HURIWA recalled that despite having four refineries, Nigeria imports its refined petroleum products. As a result, the country spends the scarce foreign exchange (forex) to ensure no scarcity.
 
Mele Kyari, group managing director of the NNPC, had said the nation’s refineries were deliberately shut down because their operations were no longer sustainable.
 
In March 2021, the federal executive council (FEC) approved the sum of $1.5 billion for the rehabilitation of the Port Harcourt refinery. Last week, the federal government said it had processed $98 million and N17.2 billion as partial payments for the ongoing rehabilitation works at the refinery.