Maravi

Indeni runs out of crude oil

Indeni runs out of crude oil
By George Chellah
Thursday November 15, 2007 [03:00]

INDENI Petroleum Refinery Company has run out of crude oil and is expected to shut down operations by Saturday. But Ministry of Energy Permanent Secretary, Peter Mumba, said there was no need for panic because a shipment of 60,000 metric tonnes of crude oil was expected by November 24, 2007. Indeni public relations officer Mwila Nkonge referred all queries to the finance and energy ministries as they are responsible for crude oil procurement. But sources within Indeni yesterday revealed that the refinery had exhausted the last consignment that came in recently.

“We have run out of crude oil. The supplies we have will only last for today (yesterday) and probably tomorrow (today),” one of the sources disclosed. We will have a dry spell until maybe early December without crude oil. This means that the refinery will be shut down from this Friday until early December. So, the truth is that the refinery will shut down operations because of lack of feed stock or lack of crude oil.”

The source disclosed that the refinery was likely to resume operations in December when the government procures the feedstock.

“We will shut down and we are expecting that the government procures the crude oil by December 3rd or 4th, 2007,” another source said. “And management is saying that it’s the government’s fault because they have removed Total from the procurement of crude oil and they are now procuring it themselves.”

The source further disclosed that the government had been trying to access funds from the Bank of Zambia (BoZ) to procure the feed stock for the refinery.

“They have been pushing for about US$65 million from the Bank of Zambia to purchase but we don’t know how far they have gone with that,” the source said.

The source warned that if the government did not act quickly, the shutdown could plunge the country into another serious fuel crisis.

“The implications of the shutdown are obvious. There is a possibility of shortages of fuel products on the market,” the source revealed. “So we are likely to experience fuel shortages similar to the ones we had recently.

“And of course the financial position of Indeni Petroleum Refinery Company will be affected because there will be no production for such a long time.”

When contacted, Indeni public relations officer Mwila Nkonge referred all queries to the finance and energy ministries.
“The Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Energy are the ones procuring the crude oil so I think they have the right information,” Nkonge said.

But Mumba said the matter of crude oil had been solved by the Ministry of Finance and Indeni.

“The issue of crude oil has been sorted out. We don’t see any reason for panic. We are expecting crude oil to arrive any time this month. We are expecting crude oil on the 24th of this month to be specific,” Mumba said. “We are expecting about 60,000 metric tonnes any time this month and another 90,000 metric tonnes by the end of December.

“This is before we enter into a long-term arrangement with some suppliers. We are running a tender which ends on November 16. We want to pick suppliers to give us feed stock for the next two years.”

Labels: INDENI, OIL

posted by MrK @ 8:12 AM