17/10/2001 23:34 - (SA) E-mail story to a friend Nigeria shuts down oil refinery

Abuja - Nigeria has shut its 125 000 barrel-a-day refinery in the southern city of Warri following a pipeline explosion, a senior official said on Wednesday.

"We had to shut the refinery down on Tuesday because we ran out of crude supply to it," the managing director of state-run Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Jackson Gaius-Obaseki, told reporters.

"For the third time since June, our crude oil supply was brought down by saboteurs using explosives," said Gaius-Obaseki.

The Warri refinery, commissioned more than 20 years ago, is Nigeria's second largest refinery after the one in the southern oil city of Port Harcourt.

Gaius-Obaseki did not identify the suspected saboteurs. He also declined to say if any of them had been arrested.

He warned that the refinery in northern city of Kaduna, which has a refining capacity of 110 000 barrels per day, may also be shut later in the week.

Warri refinery supplies crude to the Kaduna operation.

The explosion happened between the towns of Escravos and Warri in the Niger-Delta region of the country, he said, without giving further details.

The closing of the Warri refinery will not affect fuel supply in Nigeria as the nation has about 17 days of reserve.

Gaius-Obaseki said he expected security agents to apprehend those behind the pipeline explosion.

Nigeria has taken measures to tighten security around its oil installations to forestall any attacks in the wake of US-led air strikes on targets in Afghanistan, AIT television reported late Tuesday.

Nigeria derives more than 95% of its revenue from oil. - Sapa-AFP

http://www.news24.co.za/News24/Africa/West_Africa/0,1113,2-11-998_1095649,00.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), October 17, 2001