Dangote aims at oil and gas with $16b refinery
Dangote Group of Companies, renowned in the production and distribution of cement in the West African sub-region are now wading into the oil and gas sector and is envisaged to have the largest oil refinery company in Africa
The $16 billion world class refinery/ Petrochemical complex comprise a refinery, petrochemical and fertilizer plants.
This came to light when Mr Anthony Chiejina, Chief Corporate Communications Manager of Dangote Group briefed Ghanaian journalists who are currently in Nigeria on the invitation of Dangote Group of Companies to acquaint themselves of their operations and how synergies could be drawn with the public sector.
The project, which is sited at the Dangote Free Zone, Lekki, Lagos, occupies 2,630 hectares of land and with capacity to produce 650,000 barrel of crude per day remains the single largest industrial undertaking in the world.
Mr Chiejina said the first phase of petrochemicals manufacturing would be integrated with the refinery and would produce 750,000 metric tonnes of polypropylene per annum, while the fertilizer plant would produce 2.8 million metric tonnes per annum of urea and ammonia.
The Chief Corporate Communications Manager said gas from the Gas pipeline project would supply fuel to central power plants to generate electricity for households, while the refinery would create 1,600 permanent and 100,000 indirect jobs.
He said the project, which would be completed in 2019 would serve both the domestic and external market, with West Africa as the major beneficiary.
On Corporate Social Responsibility for the 17 West African countries it is currently operating in, Mr Chiejina said although it would base on country and community specifics, Dangote is constructing mobile clinics, schools, hospitals, community health centres and providing scholarships to students in their operational areas in Nigeria.
He said Dangote Cement, which is currently producing cement in Ghana, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Congo and Cameroun among other countries, would by the end of 2017 complete the Takoradi Grinding Cement Plant.
Mr Chiejina however explained that infrastructural deficit especially on roads and housing projects in most of their operational areas in West Africa is serving as a major challenge to performance.
Mr Etornam Komla Buami, Media Relations Manager of Dangote Cement, Ghana Limited said such visits would equip Journalists with knowledge about the Group to portray their performance to the outside world.
He said it would also forge the Public-Private partnership synergies in Nigeria and their other operational areas in the sub-region and beyond.
Source: GNA