Owei Lakemfa
3 September 2008
opinion
OUR four epileptic refineries are publicly owned. Despite years of 'Turn Around Maintenance', which gulps billions of Naira annually, they remain incredibly inefficient.
We are told nobody in the Private Sector is willing to invest in refineries because it would not be profitable.
But in the last eight weeks, some two hundred and twenty private refineries have surfaced especially in Rivers, Bayelsa and Delta States. No, they are not gigantic. They were not built by European and American companies.
They imported no components nor are there 'experts' or expatriates working in them. But they work!
They produce basic petroleum products like diesel and 'precious' petrol. They are 'illegal' refineries built from scratch by supposed illiterates or barely literate people who may have no training whatsoever in engineering. Their 'expertise' and technology is one hundred per cent local.
The latest discovery was a refinery located between Dere and Bolo communities in Rivers State. As was done to the others, the Joint Military Task Force raided the refinery, destroyed it, seized the land and detained suspects.
I do not know what has happened to all the suspects arrested so far, but I guess 'investigations' are continuing, and they will soon be charged to court. That is all there is to it, as far as the ruling elite and their military is concerned.
After all, the refineries are 'illegal' because they have not been registered under the Companies Act, pay no tax after profit and most importantly, must have stolen or bought stolen crude oil.
So Government and its agents view the whole issue from the parochial prism of 'illegality' not the fact that our locals are showing that they have the brains to build and run refineries no matter how crude the system is.
In other countries where the ruling elite still use their brains, rather than destroy these admittedly small and crude refineries, they would be studied. A serious country would want to know how these hundreds of illegal refineries were built, the local technology used and how they can be improved.
Smart countries would not round up and imprison the operators. Rather, they would cultivate and build them into a core that would develop our refining technology and free us from the hopeless dependency on foreigners.
During the Second World, the Americans encouraged German scientists to cross over and build its military power including the atomic bomb. Rather than drag the Nazi scientists to prison or the gallows, the Americans funded their scientific research. That was how the jet engine was pioneered.
Anybody who has studied India's progress, would know that its local technology started from the same rudimentary levels as the illegal refineries in the Niger Delta. Which Law of science, nature or business states that we must have huge, rambling refineries before we can produce our basic petroleum needs?
There is no reason why we cannot have families who refine petroleum products for our use.
The basic problems we have include colonised minds running our systems and a belief that if things are not imported, or 'expatriates' work on projects, then they cannot be good.
Also, our elite have a fixation with the unitary system; everything must come from a centre. Basic things like electricity and railways must be controlled from Abuja. Even the issuance of driver's license or registration of companies must be by the centre. Basic things states can do are taken over by the Federal Government which has built a huge, money - gulping bureaucracy that cannot move and is incapable of taking basic initiatives.
We are held hostage by a unitary system of government oiled by free oil money with elite who live like the legendary Abdul.
That is, a man who wants to be rich and live a wealthy life without working. It is therefore not surprising that we have an indolent ruling elite which produces nothing but lives off the country's resources.
They have turned government into the most profitable business venture where monthly, they share wealth from the Federation account.
For them, having small refineries run by the local people does not make sense. If there are to be refineries, they have to either be quoted at the Stock Exchange or built on a grand scale and run under all sorts of political guises; quota system, Federal character, and geographically disadvantaged.
To them, the crude refineries pose a greater danger; if we are to refine all our petroleum products, how can they make the money they now corner in the name of fuel importation, demurrage and subsidies?
As part of the fuel product importation game, the President Umar Yar'Adua's administration, has invited Nigerians to a 'Debate' on subsidy removal and determination of 'appropriate' price increase.
Its Minister of State for Energy (Petroleum) Mr. Odien Ajumogobia makes the same wrinkled arguments military dictators made 25 years ago; that money to be 'saved' will be used to finance roads, electricity, health services bla, bla, bla!
The basic question is, what does the government do with the country's huge resources if it is not spending it to build basic infrastructure?
Of course, he delves into the ugly past and resurfaces with the old trite arguments; subsidy will have to be removed and fuel prices increased because of rising crude oil prices and unstable currency exchange.
A simple policy of setting aside some of the crude oil God has given us for domestic consumption solves these twin problems. But the ruling elite will never allow a Nigeria that is self sufficient. For them, the Nigerian people must be made to suffer deprivation and want, so the elite can continue living off the country's collective wealth.
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