The Nigerian government is in talks with the government of Saudi Arabia over its refinery rehabilitation deal.
Some conditions of the deal include the pledge by Saudi officials to fix Nigeria’s four broken oil refineries.
The four broken refineries have been moribund for years, with Nigeria having to import all of its fuel.
The government of Nigeria on its part revealed it will finalise the details of the deal with Saudi Arabia within six months.
According to a report published by VOA which quoted Emmanuel Afimia, founder of Enermics, a Lagos based oil and gas consulting firm, there i scepticism about the success of the deal.
“This administration is showing a reasonable level of political will to make things happen. I’ll most definitely like to wait until the technical details of this deal comes out but from where I’m looking at it, I don’t think it’s gonna be possible,” he said.
Nigeria could process around 450,000 barrels of crude oil into fuel every day if the refineries get functional.
The deal between the two countries were made on the sidelines of the first ever Saudi-Africa summit held in Riyadh last week.
Nigeria’s President, Bola Tinubu had met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman as part of his government’s efforts to attract investors, with Saudi officials pledging to fix Nigeria’s four refineries, located in Rivers, Delta and Kaduna states.
According to a government official who spoke to newsmen after last week’s agreement, fixing the refineries will take two years.
