Page 57

Page 57

Letter to the Editor

PDP Shut Up!

Our attention has been drawn to the campaign of calumny and obnoxious propaganda PDP’s Olis Metuh and its Governors have been making to distract the attention of Nigerians from asking PDP leaders to return our stolen money. Olisa Metuh should shut up and cover his face in shame, rather than engaging in unnecessary vituperation. He should call all present PDP appointees not to steal Nigerian masses money. He should call Akpabio, Diezani, Dasuki, Labaran Maku etc. to return our money they borrowed in the name of looting. Let me ask Father Chukwuma where was he when Goodluck Jonathan formed his cabinet? 80% of perm secs today are southerners. The Father should face his spiritual work and stop interfering in governance. Mr. Fayose and other PDP governors should quickly declare their assests. Appointment of those to run the affairs of Nigeria is based on merit not considering tribe, religion or god fatherism. The Igbos should stop making noise about position because their aim was not for the continuity of Nigeria as a nation. They still believe in secession, they must believe in the sovereignty of Nigeria first otherwise they will remain forever like that. Aminu D. Mohammed, National President Northern Youth Consultative Forum (NYCF)

Text Messages

Bailout fund

The bailout fund is surely a negative economic formulation employed that will sink the states further into indebtedness and impossible debt servicing with few states having internal revenue to pay workers salaries. Fayose of Ekiti was realistic to it have tabled for the citizens and passed a verdict over it and put it on record to whosoever will inherit him from accusation. The Bauchi governor called it a mirage indeed lucky Bauchi got the least amount. The drama will come in event of handover to another administration a situation that will cause war of words.07030993513

Borno 100 days

100 days and above but it is still very silent and no any recorded achievement made so far by the able Governor of Borno Kashim Shettima. Galadiman Zanna 08035097026

Re: Senator Shehu Sani

It is not easy to adjust to my new status, says Sani. It is a paradox that Sen. Shehu Sani (Kaduna Central) who has been known for unmasked intelligence, wisdom, criticism, advocacy and justice and social security in the interview could not give a valid reason behind his preference for camel as gifts to paupers during Ramadan or Sallah. The question is given to a person or group of four but only 7 can use one camel for the sacrifice at the cost that can buy each a ram for higher reward. Mohammed Bagudu, Minna 08159500975

Cattle rustling in Zamfara

The slow on-going operation against rustlers in Zamfara state, who is to blame among the following categories of people: Animal breeders, security agents, or the state government? Whatever may be the case, cooperation and collaboration amongst the mention personnel are in need indeed, in order to bring back sustainable peace in our dear state.

All stakeholders must be on one desk for the purpose of taking possible actions to crushed rustling and its sustained,

Likewise ,the victims of the tremendous animals stealing are in critical condition and need urgent help from who so ever is responsible to help them, directly or indirectly.

Nura Sule Jangebe, Zamfara State Nigeria.

07051184738.

Unethical practise by Ilorin diagnostic centre

On the 3rd of September, 2015, myself, my mother and two other witnesses from my end as a party, my alleged father, Engr. Shehu Sulyman Warah who has denied my paternity for 23 years, his new wife and one Mr. Idris another party as his witness were present at the Harmony Advanced Diagnostic Centre (HADC), Ilorin for a DNA test to determine my paternity that has been in dispute.

The samples of our saliva were taken (myself and Engr. Sulyman Warah) and the Doctor on duty immediately sent for a courier service rider to dispatch the specimen to Lagos for a laboratory test and that the result shall be opened in the presence of all the witnesses in a few days time. We all departed in good faith.

I was called to show up at the centre and all the parties involved, we showed up and my grandfather Alh. Ajamajebi who was not initially present showed up but one of my witnesses could not be present. In line with our earlier agreement, I taught the result will be brought in sealed but the Doctor merely read from his laptop a mail sent to his e-mail box.

This negates our earlier agreement, there is a foul play, we left our e-mail behind on the first day, no message(s) was sent to me.

Please investigate this matter with a view to redeeming the image of the organization. Ishola Olushola Warah 07065073610 [email protected]

FG doesn’t need to sell our refineries

By Engr. Ladi Utieyione

There have been controversies among Nigerians on the media on sales and refunds of proceeds of our national assets- refineries.

The Nigerian refineries does not need to be sold to any private company as this will further hinder our pride as a nation with such populated capacity we need to generate and distribute our own manufactured petroleum products so that the average Nigerian can at least live a standard life of cooking their meals and cheap access to public transportation.

It is clear that Nigeria as a nation through our past government had a vision for equality of her citizen and a normal life style for an average Nigerian as one of its sole reason the refineries where built to service all areas in Nigeria in accordance to the national distribution plan for all these refined products as this will enable all citizens be serviced with this products for their daily needs be it transportation or cooking and whatever need for them to use this products.

It was noted that during the construction of these refineries the Nigerian government contracted foreign consulting firms to create and build these refineries and after construction the expatriates where on ground to supervise the production and the management for some years.

Most of the refineries around the world today are older compared to the Nigerian refineries. (Warri 1978, Kaduna refinery 1980 and Port-Harcourt refinery, 1989)

The famous Corpus Christi refinery was built in 1975, the famous Amsterdam refinery was built in 1965 and a couple of other refineries that Nigeria crude oil is been refined today are not less than 40 years old. It’s amazing that 90% of Nigerian crude oil is been refined in these old refineries processed and re-sold to Nigerians for a fee.

Our dear country still need to be enlightened about the maritime oil explorations and distribution of said petroleum products.

Nigeria does not need to sell its refineries, all we require as a nation is to employ the services of world renowned refinery experts to come and manage the state of affairs of our refineries. Our major challenge is man power management of these refineries.

The age of the current refinery engineers and personnel currently running all our Nigerian refineries are obsolete and still practice old methodology of several decades. Though its amounts to experience but you see current computerize age has overtaken their skills as they might not be able to match up with the current method of managing these facilities. The Federal Government have to overhaul the man power system of the refineries, put up a consulting firm to manage the day to day running of the refineries.

At this point the federal government should send most of her new university graduates to special training on refinery project management and different academy that will teach these young men the latest skills of operating this facility. Most of this course are not more than 12 months after which they will come back home to partake in the practical work in our local refineries and train local graduates as well. Then learn from the consulting firm with the aim of developing these young technocrats to be able to man the facility at some point. The government could as well employ the strategy of inviting facilitators to the country to train local graduates.

The FGN should make sure that the actual cost of the parts needed for re installation of damages of improve faculty should be vetted by experts with honesty and open market value for all item(s) that will be needed for the upgrade of the refinery.

It’s clear that private businesses are sabotaging the growth of this process by creating different atrocities in pipe lines. They influence manufacturing company to hype the price of the spares needed for upgrading, vandalize the facility by one way or the other so that they can continue to service the nation and reaping money off our dear nation.

Recently, NNPC stock reconciliation committee recommended that cost of operating these refinery and shipping cost is on the high side and that is one reason our refinery should be sold. As a shipping expert, I must say here that the cost shown from that NNPC committee in spending 12m$ for lifting and transporting of this crude from offshore to our refineries is not correct and regarded as false statement.

Ship sailing from offshore Gulf of Guinea for instance to any of the south-south refinery is less than 24 hours voyage to the jetty for discharge.

Normally operation circle is not more than 30 days for the mother vessels carrying large cargos and shuttle vessels should be based on spot charter.

Mother vessel Freight is average of 80,000$ per day

Shuttle vessels Freight is average of 12,000$ per day

Fenders and hoses including mooring masters and security is average of 5,000$ per day including bunkers for their movement in and out of the area of operations.

Since it’s our national products the need for government fees does not apply. Adding these figures does not amount up to 5 million dollars for operations from offshore to jetty for discharge.

This logistic payment is the only fee needed to be paid to move cargo for refining in our local refineries and if necessary to transport the product directly to Amsterdam, the trip should not elapse 20 days or to America for about 14 days, this means the vessel will not use up to the calculated 30 days figure.

It’s mandatory that the federal government should also seek the services of shipping experts for consultancy and management of these logistics to properly manage the shipping operations with a minimal price and quality service as this will go a long way to save the government from losses and will improve the system of operation in Nigeria.

Utieyione (MMS), is of the Overseas Marine Services Ltd [email protected]