NNPCL Sacks MDs of Port Harcourt, Warri, Kaduna Refineries
The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) has removed the Managing Directors of its three state-owned refineries and directed management staff with less than a year to retirement to proceed on exit.
In what appears to be a major shake-up, the company has also promoted some personnel to replace the outgoing staff as part of efforts to reposition the organisation under a new leadership structure.
According to reports, the development was communicated to affected employees via individual emails, although the total number of those impacted remains unclear.
Sources confirmed that the Managing Director of the Port Harcourt Refining Company Limited (PHRC), Ibrahim Onoja; the Managing Director of Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company (KRPC), Dr Mustafa Sugungun; and the Managing Director of Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company Limited (WRPC), Efifia Chu, have all been removed. Replacements for their roles have yet to be officially announced.
President Bola Tinubu had earlier sacked the former Group Chief Executive Officer of NNPC, Mele Kyari, along with the company’s board, and appointed former Shell Nigeria boss, Bayo Ojulari, as the new head of the national oil company.
Economic Confidential gathered that Bala Wunti, the former Chief Upstream Investment Officer at the National Petroleum Investment Management Services (NAPIMS), who was recently reassigned to head the HSC office in Abuja, is no longer with the company.
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A senior insider, speaking off the record, confirmed the removals but dismissed suggestions that the changes were about removing loyalists of the former GCEO.
The insider further noted that some senior staff had already been promoted. The reshuffle displaced heads of crude of trading, Human Resources and Relationship and Stakeholder Management.
The source said the positions have been replaced internally, adding that the changes has triggered upward movement within the system.
The NNPCL had on Tuesday came under fire as the $897m Warri refinery revamp flopped. The report also stated that the Port Harcourt refinery had been struggling at under 40 per cent. production capacity.
Industry operators and experts questioned the operational integrity of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, particularly regarding transparency, efficiency, and overall management of Nigeria’s refineries under its purview.
This was after the revelation that the Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company has remained shut since January 25, 2025, due to safety issues in its Crude Distillation Unit Main Heater.
An April 2025 document on the Midstream and Downstream sector obtained from the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority revealed that the refinery, which consumed $897.6m in maintenance costs, failed to produce Premium Motor Spirit (petrol) and was shut down barely a month after former NNPCL boss, Kyari, declared it operational.
Industry operators and experts described this as disheartening, while further findings showed that the Port Harcourt Refining Company, which resumed operations in November 2024, had been operating below 40 per cent capacity.
