The Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL), Mele Kyari, has disclosed that in Nigeria, everyone is involved in crude oil theft. Kyari stated this today when he received a delegation of the members House of Representatives Special Committee on Oil Theft went on an oversight function at the headquarters of the NNPCL in Abuja. According to him, the company has recorded about 9000 infractions on its pipelines within just one year.
Kyari said, from 2022 to date, the company has deactivated 6,465 illegal refineries across the Niger-Delta region whom were all involved in illegal bunkering activities.
In his statement, “We have also removed 4,876 illegal connections to a pipeline out of 5,570 that we have discovered”.
Although he noted that the NNPCL was not really sure if that was the actual number of illegal connection to the asset.
The NNPCL boss explained “Some of the scale of the infraction that we see is unbelievable; we are not able to deal with it. When you remove one connection, the next day in the same location, someone will replace it.
“It is obvious that crude oil theft is almost an end-to-end issue in Nigeria; it is very obvious that everyone is involved.
“In most of these locations, they are less than a hundred meters from the settlement; some are even less than a hundred meters from the local government headquarters.”
Considering the enormous scale sabotage he revealed “these evils are being perpetrated unabated, adding that this makes it impossible to guarantee the production that would happen the next day.”
The single menace that has been a nightmare to the NNPCL is security of the pipeline, adding that to curtail the problem, NNPCL moved to incorporating all security agencies into a single platform, including private security.
Lamenting, kyari said, “It is very obvious that despite all the integrity issues with our pipeline and our facilities, we have capacity beyond 2 million barrels per day without doing anything.
“But today, we are struggling to meet the budget estimate of 1.6 million barrels per day. This by no means is related to crude oil theft.
“In 2022, it became so obvious that if something dramatic is not done, we are going to run into trouble. On a specific date, our production came down to as low as 1.1 million barrels per day. And on a particular date, we have gone below a million barrels.”
During the meeting, the Chairman of the Special Committee, Rep. Alhassan Ado-Doguwa, said it was common knowledge that operating oil and gas pipelines in Nigeria was a herculean challenge.
He acknowledged that hardly a week went by without an infraction or damage to an oil or gas pipeline in the country.
According to him, it is also saddening that these infractions do not stop with the pipelines as daily breaches are also recorded at the oil well heads, flow stations, loading, and export terminals, among others.
Doguwa laments that the shrouded way of regulatory activities at Nigeria’s crude oil export terminals was alarming.
The lawmaker added, “We are compiling the facts and figures. Instances where approvals are hastily granted to vessels involved in crude theft just to cover official complicity are reported.
“Incidences of undeclared lifting’s are noted, and all these and several other infractions, particularly in our offshore marine environment, contribute to the huge volume of crude oil theft being reported.”
He explained that it was on record that Nigeria has been bedevilled by crude oil theft and pipeline vandalism of enormous proportions, most of which he said occurred within the Niger Delta region.
