How Buhari, Late Kyari hindered me from purchasing $2.5bn oilfield – Elumelu

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Chairman of Heirs Holdings and UBA Group Plc, Mr Tony Elumelu has disclosed how Former President Muhammadu Buhari and his late Chief of Staff, Abba Kyari hindered him from purchasing a $2.5bn oilfield.

 

Elumelu made this known in a chat with Financial Times.

Addressing why he decided to venture into the oil sector, Elumelu said the decision was influenced by his vision to make Heirs Holding a Fortune 500 company.

“We wanted to become a Fortune 500 company and we estimated what we needed. It’s not naira, it’s huge dollars. Energy security is crucial for a country that doesn’t produce enough electricity for its roughly 200mn citizens,” he explained.

“Heirs Holdings had been looking to purchase an oilfield since 2017. We raised $2.5bn to purchase a different one. But in a twist, never previously disclosed, former president Muhammadu Buhari and his chief of staff, the late Abba Kyari, blocked the deal.” Elumelu disclosed.

He added that that he was told Nigeria couldn’t allow something of such strategic importance to fall into the hands of a private operator.

This defied logic, he adds, since he would have been purchasing it from a foreign company.

Elumelu however dislodged his frustration on the losses being incurred to crude theft.

He disclosed that the field managed by Heirs Energies produces 42,000 barrels of crude pumped out daily with about 18 per cent of production being stolen by oil thieves.

“This is oil theft, we’re not talking about stealing a bottle of Coke you can put in your pocket. The government should know, they should tell us who is stealing our oil. You bring vessels to our territorial waters and we don’t know?” He lamented.