Diala reacts to DEFENDER’s report “Dangote’s petrol, denied at home, in high demand internationally”

By BASHIR ADEFAKA

“Nations far and near are planning to come over to our backyard to buy and lift petrol produced by our kinsman, while our collectively owned NNPCL and our kinsmen petroleum marketers are hustling for import licenses from our jointly owned NMDPRA to import the same petrol, possibly of lesser quality, from abroad.”

Dr. Uche Diala, a Nigerian public affairs analyst, has described the anti-development attitude of Nigerian system  and people, which they displayed towards the one only privately owned petroleum refinery ever in Africa’s most populous country, Dangote Refinery, as one of “a self defeatist people who cut our nose to spite our nose”.

He was reacting to a report earlier published by The DEFENDER headlined “Twist of fate as Dangote’s petrol, denied at home, in high demand internationally” with a rider showing that South Africa and seven other countries are now set to lift fuel from the Dangote Refinery in Lagos.

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According to Dr. Dialla, “Nations far and near are planning to come over to our backyard to buy and lift petrol produced by our kinsman, while our collectively owned NNPCL and our kinsmen petroleum marketers are hustling for import licenses from our jointly owned NMDPRA to import the same petrol, possibly of lesser quality, from abroad.”

“Talk about the proverbial wise man who dies behind a foolish man’s house,” he lashed at them.

ALSO READ: Villified at home, more foreign countries to buy fuel from Dangote Refinery in Nigeria

Diala, who wrote in a reaction posted on his verified Facebook social media timeline in Saturday, said, “Recently, the Chairman of the National Petroleum Authority of Ghana, Mustapha Abdul-Hamid, said the arrangement with Dangote refinery would end his country’s monthly $400m fuel imports from Europe.”

ALSO READ: Dangote to buy crude oil from Caribbean country of Grenada

“Now I ask …,” he continued:

“So, those countries, including Ghana, coming to buy PMS in Nigeria from Dangote Refinery do not know the road to where our own NNPCL and marketers buy “cheaper” PMS abroad?

“I continue to say that we are not serious as a nation (from the government to the citizens in the large part), and that is not an insult. It’s a fact.

“Well, Aliko Dangote and his Refinery have nothing to lose. They will be cashing out and in dollars, which is even sweeter.

“It is our nation and us all who have everything to lose. Until the day we recall common sense reasoning from wherever we banished it to.

“Good luck to us.

“Congratulations to Dangote,” Uche Diala said sounding proudly Nigerian.