Dangote Group of track to commence construction of refinery

Aliko Dangote – Founder, Chairman and CEO of the Dangote Group

The Dangote Refinery and Petrochemical Company is on track to receiving a licence to begin preliminary work on its proposed petroleum refining project from the Nigerian Department of Petroleum Resources. The federal agency is reported to have concluded the evaluation of the necessary technical details and specifications on the first stage of the project.

The company – a subsidiary of the Dangote Group, is expected to be given a Licence-To-Establish (LTE) and as work progresses there would be further evaluation by agents from the Department of Petroleum Resources. Based on the outcome of the evaluation, another licence – Approval-To–Construct (ATC) will be issued. The final phase of the licencing process includes the issuance of the Licence-To-Operate (LTO), which would come after every structure has been put in place, by the Dangote Refinery and Petrochemical Company – including all the processing units.

According to industry sources, the Dangote Group has scaled through all the technical details, including acquiring the land where the refinery will be constructed; submitted engineering details to the department of petroleum resources and paid the necessary monies and taxes to the Nigerian federal government.

With all these done, the source said that the company is expected to commence construction work on the 400,000 barrels per day refinery – the first privately owned petroleum refinery complex on the African continent.

It is expected that construction and commissioning of the refinery would create 8,000 jobs.