Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipre Sylva, has insisted that the approval of 1.5 billion dollars for the rehabilitation of the Port Harcourt Refinery is not a waste.
TrackNews Online recalls that the Federal Executive Council (FEC) on Wednesday approved 1.5 billion dollars for the rehabilitation of the Port Harcourt Refinery in Rivers State.
Reacting, the former Governor of Anambra State, Peter Obi, slammed the Federal Government of Nigeria for approving $1.5 billion to renovate the Port Harcourt refinery.
Obi, in a tweet via his Twitter handle on Friday, said it was a ‘huge waste’ for the present administration to renovate the Port Harcourt refinery with such an amount of money.
However, Sylva in an interview on Channels Television, while reacting to the backlash insisted that the rehabilitation exercise is not a waste as held by many.
He added that there are plans to also fix the Warri and the Kaduna refineries.
Sylva further gave an assurance that the Port Harcourt refinery will be functional in 18 months.
“Port Harcourt Refinery will work, and certainly within the next 18 months.
“There are plans to also fix the Warri refinery and Kaduna refinery, and then we would get all those staff to work.
“I will like to note that this rehabilitation is going to be funded, and it is not going to be all debts.
“We are not planning to borrow all the monies that are going into the rehabilitation project.
“Some of the money will come from NNPC’s Internally Generated Revenue from NPDC, while some of it will come from the Federal appropriation, and then a little fraction from the African Export-Import Bank,” he said.
