The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, has received bids from 96 companies, which have shown interest in the rehabilitation of its downstream infrastructure.
The corporation, in a statement on Thursday, said the selected firms would restore critical pipelines, depots and terminals through the Build, Operate and Transfer financing model.
The Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division of the NNPC, Dr Kennie Obateru, said the virtual public bid opening exercise was held at the NNPC Towers in Abuja for the pre-qualification of companies for the contract.
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It said the public opening of the bids for the contract was in keeping with the NNPC Management’s commitment to transparency and accountability in all its processes and transactions.
Speaking at the event, the Managing Director of the Nigerian Pipelines and Storage Company (NPSC), Mrs. Ada Oyetunde, explained that 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.
She stressed that the objective was to get them ready to support the refineries when they became operational after their rehabilitation.
“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 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,” Oyetunde stated.
The NPSC boss said that 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, according to her, will be done through an open access model and 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.
She assured the bidding firms of a fair, equitable and transparent selection process.
