President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has assured Nigerians that the country’s refineries will be revived after undergoing a comprehensive structural and economic reset.
The president gave the assurance on Thursday in Abuja when he received the national executive of the Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG), led by its National President, Salimon Oladiti, at the State House.
According to a statement by Bayo Onanuga, Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Tinubu said the government would not allow the refineries to waste away, considering the huge investments made in them over the years.
He said detailed research, technical assessments, restructuring and improved management would be deployed to identify and address the structural, operational, financial and managerial challenges affecting the facilities.
“The refineries that you mentioned are going to come back to work; we’re just building a very firm, resetting, and structural reworking of the economy of it,” Tinubu said.
The president stressed that the mere appearance of flames and smoke from a refinery should not be interpreted as evidence that it is functioning effectively, arguing that the facilities must operate profitably and deliver the value for which they were established.
Tinubu also accepted responsibility for fixing the challenges inherited by his administration, saying the assets and liabilities of previous governments were now his responsibility as president.
“No matter what has happened in the years past, it’s now my responsibility as president to fix it and make it work for the greatest common good of our population,” he said.
He further appealed to Nigerians to remain committed to democracy, describing it as a system that provides freedom and opportunity and promising that the country would experience better days.
On local government autonomy, Tinubu said constitutional issues surrounding its implementation were being reviewed for possible fine-tuning and appealed to stakeholders for understanding.
The President also paid tribute to the late former NUPENG president, Frank Kokori, whom he credited with playing a role in Nigeria’s struggle for democratic rule.
“You brought good memories of my relationship with Frank Kokori; may his soul rest in peace. We struggled for this democratic dispensation together,” Tinubu said.
Tinubu also promised greater inclusion for NUPENG in the implementation of the Presidential Initiative on Compressed Natural Gas (CNG), while challenging the union to ensure the benefits of the programme reach ordinary commuters.
In his remarks, Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, commended NUPENG for acknowledging what he described as the positive outcomes of the Tinubu administration’s reform agenda.
Idris said such public recognition by a major trade union was uncommon and noted that the relationship between labour and the government had helped reduce friction.
He cited the removal of the fuel subsidy and the administration’s infrastructure development efforts among the major reforms acknowledged by the union.
NUPENG President Oladiti, in his remarks, praised Tinubu for ending the fuel subsidy regime, describing the decision as courageous and saying it had saved the country from decades of financial drain and depletion of national reserves.
He said the resources freed by the policy were beginning to support critical infrastructure development and other sectors of the economy.
Oladiti particularly commended the administration’s road construction and rehabilitation efforts, citing the 750-kilometre Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway and the 1,068-kilometre Sokoto-Badagry Superhighway.
He said improved highways were particularly important to NUPENG members, including tanker drivers, because better roads could reduce accidents, fuel spillages and loss of lives.
“For our members, a good road is the difference between arriving home safely and never arriving at all,” Oladiti said.
However, the union leader urged Tinubu to sustain efforts to revive the nation’s refineries, arguing that functional domestic refining capacity would strengthen Nigeria’s energy security, reduce dependence on imported petroleum products and create more employment opportunities.
The NUPENG leadership subsequently decorated Tinubu as the Grand Patron of the union.
