BAD FUEL: Duke Oil, Oando Plc Denies Culpability
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Two oil companies, Duke Oil and Oando Plc, have refuted culpability in the importation of adulterated fuel that hit the country recently.
Appearing before the House of Representatives Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream) investigating the circumstances of the unhealthy situation, yesterday, the companies said their product met the required Nigerian specification.
In his presentation at the public hearing, the Managing Director of Duke Oil, Lawal Sade, said the product his company imported was certified okay both at the port of loading and the port of discharge by the relevant authorities.
He, however, said they were notified by Nigerian National Petroleum Company, NNPC, Limited a few hours after the discharge that the product had some particles which made them to discontinue the process.
He said the product had since been quarantined, explaining to two members of the committee, Adedeji Olajide from Oyo State and Uche Nnam-Obi who had remarked that they were responsible for the adulterated fuel.
Sade said: “The supply of PMS to NNPC on board NPNote gariner, with IMO no 947720 with bill of lading dated January 7, just to give a background as well, in November 2021, NNPC issued a request as part of the strategic restocking to national energy security.
“Mr Chairman, yes, there was a delivery of cargo by Duke Oil like you have seen in the report and that cargo met up with the Nigerian spec as it is both at the loading and discharge ports.
“There was a confirmation by the regulator which is the new Nigerian midstream, downstream authority to discharge that cargo within the stipulated date.
‘’The cargo discharged and the vessel sailed. It was just after 24 hours of operation then, Duke Oil was notified by the NNPC that there was a complaint from some of their customers that the cargo has some particles.
In his ruling, chairman of the committee, Abdullahi Gaya, asked the company to submit all relevant documents regarding their presentation, saying they might be re-invited if necessary.
Earlier, the representative of Oando Plc, Afanga Afanga, who also appeared before the committee, said their product met the Nigerian specification.
“In line with our Direct Sale Direct Purchase contract with NNPC, on January 16, 2022, we delivered 90MT worth of PMS on board the Vessel MT Elka Apollon. It is important to note that this PMS cargo that was supplied met and was in line with all the Nigerian and DSDP contractual specifications.
“This was confirmed by the mandatory tests that were conducted at the loading port in Europe and before discharge in Nigeria by independent NNPC quality inspectors and finally by agents of the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Regulatory Authority. It is on this basis that the cargo was certified and accepted for discharge by NNPC.
“As clearly stated by NNPC last week when they were before this honourable committee, it’s current inspection protocol does not include testing for methanol content and thus was not detected by the NNPC quality inspectors.”
‘’The most important thing at this juncture for us is to work with NNPC as we are committed to ensuring that what is brought into the country is well treated and the issues around the situation are alleviated for Nigerians. We have given assurances and we have also been able to show to be following the right protocol that we followed and there was nothing that was breached as being alleged,” he said
Ruling on the matter, the chairman of the committee asked the company to standby as they might be re-invited.
