Akinteye Babatunde, Senate President, National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS); Devakumar Edwin, Vice President, Oil and Gas, Dangote Industries Ltd (second left); Musa Bala, Head of Administration, Dangote Petroleum Refinery (second right), and Mowete Amaka Amaka Juliet, Vice President, Inter-Campus Affairs, NANS, during the NANS’ delegates visit to Dangote Petroleum Refinery, Petrochemicals and Fertiliser Plants in Lekki, Lagos.
Students across tertiary institutions in the country under the aegis of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) have passed a vote of confidence on the Dangote Refinery, describing the recent demarketing of the world’s largest single train refinery as the greatest disservice to the nation’s economy.
The students’ position came amid alleged efforts to induce the students body’s leadership with $250,000 to dissuade it from going ahead to declare support for Dangote Refinery.
Speaking after a tour of the refinery facility on Thursday in Lagos, leaders of the students’ body comprising of those from universities, polytechnics and colleges of education, said it would take an enemy of Nigeria to rubbish the gigantic project that would stop importation of fuel once and for all and save the nation of the scarce forex.
The NANS Senate President, Akinteye Babatunde Afiz, addressing the management of the Dangote Refinery said they had the mandate of Nigerian students to come and assess the situation of the refinery having been told that the refinery was uncompleted and inferior in all standards.
He said: “We had a meeting on the situation in the country vis a vis the uncertainty in the oil and gas industry, especially the current fuel scarcity and we resolved to visit Dangote refinery to see things for ourselves, Having gone round the facility, our heart melted at the humongous size of the refinery.
“We are speaking the minds of all Nigerian students that government should direct all marketers to patronise Dangote refinery and ease the current fuel hardship. If anyone wants to compete with Dangote let them go and build their own. Government has four refineries and they are not working yet they don’t want the one that is available to sell. We will not accept that.
“Dangote Refinery has come to stay. We have discovered that all claims being bandied around are false. Our impression is that they never expected the refinery to stand, that is why they are against you. But we are pledging our resolve to stand by you.
“We have seen the refinery laboratory and we could see that it is world class. We cant allow this type of project that holds great potential for Nigeria’s economy to go down through some people’s disdain for the success of Alhaji Aliko Dangote.” He then urged the government to do all possible to support Dangote Refinery and protect it from saboteurs.
Earlier, the Vice-President, Dangote Industries Limited, Devakumar Edwin, while welcoming the student leaders to the refinery thanked them for the concern for the facility and the resolve to stand for the truth by rejecting the monetary inducement.
He told the students that President Tinubu has intervened and commended the president for the directive for crude to be sold to Dangote Refinery in naira currency, saying it is a good development for all Nigerians.
Edwin said the concern of the students was well placed as all Nigerians should be worried indeed because about 90 percent of Nigeria forex goes into importation of fuel and that Dangote Refinery could help solve the problem as 43 percent of its capacity production could satisfy domestic demand while the remaining will be exported to generate more forex into the country.
Wondering why anyone would want to frustrate the refinery, Edwin noted, “So much has been spent on the government refineries and there was nothing to show for it as they remained moribund.
“What we want to do in refinery, we have done it in other businesses. Nigeria used to be the biggest importer of sugar, we came in and changed the narrative. We led the backward integration scheme of the Federal Government, and we now produce sugar locally for domestic consumption and others have joined us. We did same in cement by opening up production plant and today Nigeria exports cement to other countries.
“In a business, no one was interested in investing into, Dangote delved into it determined to ensure Nigeria no longer imports fuel, invested massively and come up with the world’s largest single train refinery.”
He said he would not take his money to Dubai or Swiss banks as others are doing, he decided to invest at home and now they are saying he wants to create monopoly.
“We didn’t ask for any favour other than that we want to buy crude to produce, first they said there was no crude, later they said we would have to pay some dollars above the prevailing crude market price. And this is a global market where you can track crude prices anytime. We resorted to buying crude from Brazil and United States. Later they said we should not be announcing the price of the products.