The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation plans to award 80 per cent of crude lifting contracts to one of its subsidiaries, the NNPC Trading Limited. At the moment, 39 local and foreign firms are engaged in the crude lifting deals.

The Managing Director of NNPC Trading Limited, Mr. Ibrahim Waya, disclosed this in an interview published in the corporation’s quarterly magazine.

The trading company is currently saddled with 40 per cent of the nation’s oil lifting contracts. Waya added that the target of the firm ultimately was to handle all the lifting contracts.

He said, “The current management of the NNPC under the watch of Dr. Maikanti Baru is giving us every support to jack up our operation from 10 per cent to 40 per cent.

“The GMD told us that what he wants to achieve for trading is that by the end of 2018, he wants the NNPC Trading to have 80 per cent in terms of Nigeria’s crude oil, and also conversely by the end of 2018, we want to do every form of import of products, if need be, to augment the local production of products through the NNPC Trading.”

The Federal Government had in January this year awarded 12 months’ crude lifting contracts for about 1.31 million barrels per day to 39 companies.

This means that the next round of deals will likely take place in January 2018 and the new direction will affect how much each of the current partners gets to handle in the new business year.