The MD/CEO of Forte Oil Mr Akin Akinfemiwa, last week announced Forte Oil was in talks with a major refinery to “form a strategic partnership for local refining of petroleum products in Africa’s top oil exporter”
While he did not specifically mention which refinery they were targeting, Reuters report suggest it could be one of Nigeria’s four government-owned refineries.
The government has been exporting strategic partnership with downstream energy companies that will have them manage the refineries under what is called ROM, Run Operate and Maintain the refineries.
A few weeks back, Oando had claimed it had signed an MOU with the NNPC to operate the Port Hacrourt Refinery before it was hastily denied after a push back from Labour. Nigeria’s refineries are being refurbished and have been operating less than capacity. The Warri, Port Hacourt and Kaduna refineries operated at 0%, 9.2% and 16.9% respectively and a combined 12% for the month of May.
Nigerian refineries have also reported a YTD (May) surplus of N10.4 billion with Kaduna and Warri refineries reporting a N5.9 billion and N5.6 billion deficit respectively. Port Hacourt refinery reported a surplus of N22 billion.
Forte Oil reported that revenues from fuel was N41.2 billion representing a 48% drop from the N73.9 billion it reported in the same period in 2017. Fuel represented 88% of revenues for Forte Oil same period last year but has now dropped to just 63% of revenue.
