By Garba Muhammad
KADUNA, Nigeria (Reuters) – Nigeria’s 110,000 barrel per day refinery in the northern city of Kaduna is expected to restart by mid-April, the head of the upstream division at the state oil company said on Saturday.
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) halted crude flows to its refineries around mid-January after the key pipelines feeding the plants were attacked.
The refineries – in Kaduna, Port Harcourt and Warri – were then shut down a few days later.
“By the end of next week we will be ready to start receiving the crude oil,” said Bello Rabiu, group executive director of upstream, during a tour of the Kaduna refinery.
“If crude comes and we actually get everything ready, we believe by the middle of this month everything will be running in the refinery,” he said.
He did not mention operations at the Port Harcourt and Warri refineries. NNPC has said crude flows have started at the other refineries but there has been no word of them reopening.
Despite being Africa’s largest crude exporter, Nigeria imports almost all of its gasoline.
On Tuesday, Minister of state for Petroleum Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu said Nigeria was in talks with oil majors Chevron (CVX.N), France’s Total (TOTF.PA) and Italy’s ENI (ENI.MI) to get help revamping the ailing refineries.
(Writing by Alexis Akwagyiram; Editing by Marguerita Choy)
