THE President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), on Monday inaugurated the mega Dangote Refinery in Lekki, Lagos and used the opportunity to flaunt it and others as evidence of his uncommon achievements in office. But the picture is not so rosy when the trophies claimed by the regime are juxtaposed with current realities in the petroleum sector. The country is crumbling under a prohibitive petrol subsidy bill (January to June), aviation fuel and gas shortages, continued gas flaring, and oil majors exiting, while Nigeria struggles to meet its crude oil production quota. Buhari leaves behind an oil industry performing well below its potential and inhibited by missteps and statism.
On his assumption of office in 2015, the challenges were huge.The mess in the industry was deep; the upstream was rowdy, but remained the country’s major revenue stream. The downstream was beyond messy; corrupt, and as opaque as the upstream, it was delivering shortages,…