By Mordi chukwunonso Esther
No fewer than 96 companies from various jurisdictions have shown interest in rehabilitating the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation’s downstream infrastructure.
NNPC’s Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Kennie Obateru, said the infrastructure include critical pipelines to depots and terminals, as the firms would rehabilitate the facilities through the build, operate and transfer financing model.
This was disclosed at a virtual public bid opening exercise that was held at the NNPC headquarters in Abuja for the pre-qualification of companies for the contract.
Obateru said in a press release that the public opening of the bids for the contract was in keeping with the NNPC management’s commitment to transparency and accountability in its processes and transactions.
The Managing Director, Nigerian Pipelines and Storage Company, a subsidiary of NNPC, Ada Oyetunde, said the exercise was in conformity with the mandate of the Federal Government to prioritise the rehabilitation of critical downstream infrastructure across the country.
She listed the facilities that would be rehabilitated by successful bidders to include critical pipelines for crude oil supply to the refineries and evacuation of refined products, depots and terminals.
Oyetunde noted that the objective was to get them ready to support the refineries when they become operational after their rehabilitation.
She said, “An open tender for pre-qualification of interested companies was published in August 2020 in the national dailies for the rehabilitation of NNPC downstream critical pipelines and associated depots and terminal infrastructure.
“This was through Finance BOT to cover the four lots namely, Lot 1: Port Harcourt Refinery related infrastructure; Lot 2: Warri Refinery related infrastructure; Lot 3: Kaduna Refinery related infrastructure; and Lot 4: System 2B related infrastructure.”
According to her, the BOT arrangement would provide a reliable pipeline network and automated storage facilities for effective crude feed, product storage and evacuation from the nation’s refineries post-revamp.
This, she said, would be through an open access model and would charge market reflective prices and tariffs to recover the investment.
Earlier, the Group General Manager, Supply Chain Management, Mrs. Aisha Katagum, commended the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission, ICRC, and the Bureau of Public Procurement, BPP, for providing guidance for the project and assured the bidding firms of a fair, equitable and transparent selection process.
On hand to observe proceedings at the public bid opening exercise were representatives of the ICRC, BPP, the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, NEITI, and Civil Liberties Organisations, CLOs.
Highpoint of the event was the display of the 96 companies that submitted bids for the rehabilitation projects.
