Olusola Bello
As part of its effort to ensure sufficient domestic fuel supply, As part of its effort to ensure sufficient domestic fuel supply, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) on Friday begin a bidding process for the provision of operations and maintenance services in three of its three refineries.
NNPC on its twitter handle stated the three refineries affected as Port Harcourt Refining Company (PHRC), Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company (WRPC) and Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company (KRPC).
While calling for qualified entities to indicate their interests in the contracts,
The corporation made it clear in the bid notice that it was seeking to engage reputable and credible Operations and Maintenance (O&M) companies to operate and maintain the three facilities to ensure reliability and sustainability in order to meet the nation’s fuel supply obligation.
The scope of work according to NNPC shall cover long term as well as short term production/operations planning, production and operations execution, monitoring, reporting and optimisation of operation
For close to two years, the comatose facilities have not refined a drop of crude oil, although the corporation continues to spend close to N10 billion monthly in the “operations” of the non-functional assets.
The NNPC further noted that the contractors that would be eventually selected would be expected, among others,
Successful contractors for the jobs are expected to be knowledgeable in process and controls engineering, quality control, quality assurance and laboratory, environmental management as well as turn-around-maintenance planning and execution.
More importantly they must have experience in such maintenance jobs in Africa or in Nigeria and must provide at least three specific examples of O&M services and or Engineering, Procurement, Construction (EPC) experience on refinery, gas processing, LNG and other process industries.
Other things expected from the contractors include: evidence of compliance with the provisions of Industrial Training Fund (ITF) Amendment Act 2011. Otherwise they would not be qualified.
All the applicants are expected to comply with the Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund (NSITF) Act by inclusion of current copy of compliance certificate expiring on 31st December 2021 as well as evidence of compliance with PENCOM Reform Act 2004 by inclusion of valid pension clearance certificate expiring on 31st December 2021.
Prospective bidders must disclose whether or not any officer of the relevant committees of the NNPC or the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) is a former or present director, shareholder or has any pecuniary interest in the bidding firm.
Such company must not be in receivership, nor be subject of any form of insolvency of bankruptcy proceedings, not a tax defaulting company and that it does not have any director who has been convicted in any country for a criminal offence relating to fraud or any financial impropriety or criminal misrepresentation of falsification of facts relating to any matter.
Their audited accounts for the past four years must be made available, provide evidence of latest credit ratings and the name of the rating agency, with a demonstration of a minimum average annual turnover of at least $2 billion for the financial year ending 2020 and provide evidence of compliance with the local content Act, said the NNPC.
“Only shortlisted firms at EOI evaluation will be invited at a later date for collection of request for proposals. NNPC is not bound to shortlist any firm and reserves the right to annul the procurement process at any time without incurring any liabilities in accordance with Section 28 of the Public Procurement Act 2007,” the corporation said.