A financial and operations report just released by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) shows that Nigeria’s three refineries witnessed a dramatic increase in refining capacity utilization in March 2016 for the first time in eight months.
The refineries are the Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company, Port Harcourt Refining Company, and the Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company.
The report, explains that they processed crude at an average capacity utilization of 17.51% in March compared to 1.84% average capacity utilization the previous month.
The NNPC attributes the improvement to success achieved in the repairs of vandalized crude pipelines feeding the refineries.
Capacity utilisation of the refineries is expected to rise further in the coming months following the re-commissioning of the Escravos-Warri-Kaduna pipeline.
The Minister of State for Petroleum, Mr Ibe Kachikwu, on Tuesday again apologized to Nigerians for the prevailing long queues for petrol saying all is being done to bring the situation to normalcy.
Mr Kachikwu alongside five other ministers rendered account of what has been done in terms of government policies since the inauguration of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration during the second federal government town hall meeting in Kaduna State.
