The head of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), Mr. Bayo Ojulari, has said the company might sell some of its refineries as it continues to face serious problems trying to fix them.
Speaking during an interview with Bloomberg at the 9th OPEC International Seminar in Vienna, Austria, on Thursday, Ojulari noted that a full review of the company’s refinery operations is currently ongoing and will likely be completed before the end of 2025.
“So we’re reviewing all our refinery strategies now. We hope before the end of the year, we’ll be able to conclude that review. That review may lead to us doing things slightly differently,” he said.
When asked directly if the refineries could be sold, he responded that selling was a possible outcome of the review.
“But what we’re saying is that sale is not out of the question. All the options are on the table, to be frank, but that decision will be based on the outcome of the reviews we’re doing now,” Ojulari added.
Nigeria has for years struggled to revive its aging state-owned refineries, including those in Port Harcourt, Warri, and Kaduna. Although the Port Harcourt refinery briefly resumed operations in late 2023, it was again shut down in May 2025 due to maintenance problems.
Ojulari noted that the challenges come from both outdated facilities and new technologies not performing as expected.
“So refineries, we made quite a lot of investment over the last several years and brought in a lot of technologies. We’ve been challenged. Some of those technologies have not worked as we expected so far. But also, as you know, when you’re refining a very old refinery that has been abandoned for some time, what we’re finding is that it’s becoming a little bit more complicated,” he explained.
He also discussed Nigeria’s high oil production costs, which are between $25 and $30 per barrel. He noted that this is partly because of the money spent to secure the country’s pipelines.
“For the cost of crude production, there’s a capital cost and there are the operating costs,” he said. “The operating cost right now in Nigeria is hovering over $20 per barrel, which is quite high.
“Part of that is because of the investment we’ve had to make in terms of security of our pipelines, which, as you know, today we have 100 per cent availability of our pipelines. That came out of significant investment.
“So we believe with time, with stability, that cost will start going down, but for now it’s somewhere between $25 and $30 a barrel,” he said.
Despite these setbacks, Ojulari said NNPCL still aims to increase Nigeria’s daily oil production to 1.9 million barrels by the end of the year.
