Rep to probe Nigerian petrochemical company by Obasanjo

The House of Representatives, on Thursday, February 25, resolved to investigate the sale of Eleme Petrochamical Company in Rivers state by the Bureau of Public Enterprises. The company was sold to Indorama Corporation under the Olusegun Obasanjo privatisation program in 2006. The company is now known as Indorama Eleme Petrochemical Company. The resolution to investigate the sale of the company by the BPE followed a motion by Oluwole Oke (PDP-Osun State) who also chairs the House of Committee on Public Public Procurement. Oke noted that the company was “conceived to industrialise Nigerian and serve as Africa’s petrochemical hub.” The company was built at the Code of 2.4 billion USD “with the state of the art olefins plant, polyethylene/butane and polyprophene plant, captive power plant, caustic soda plant and otyer numerous facilities,” Oke said.

He, however, regretted the company was sold to Indorama for the sun of 215 million USD by the BPE. He further alleged that the process lacked transparency and violated Public Procurement Act. The motion gained unanimous support from the lawmakers and was therefore passed. The matter was referred to the Committee on Downstream which was asked to give report I four weeks. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives have resolved to set up an ad hoc committee to “carry out investigations of oil mining leases granted by the Federal Government in order to ascertain their total, expiry dates and whether due process and guidelines for the acquisition of oil and has assets were complied with and make appropriate recommendations to the House within five weeks.”