Segun Akanni, Toronto, Canada 
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) on Sunday released the list of 15 winners of the crude oil lifting contracts 2019/2020 under the Direct Sale of Crude Oil and Direct Purchase of Petroleum Products (DSDP) arrangement.
The publication of the list winners is coming shortly after the new Group Managing Director of the corporation, Mele Kyari, promised to make the list public as part of his commitment to ensuring transparency and accountability in the operations of the national oil company.
The list confirms PREMIUM TIMES exclusive report in June this year that 15 winners had emerged after the financial bid exercise held earlier this year.
The Winners
The statement by the NNPC spokesperson, Ndu Ughamadu, gave the list of successful companies as follows:
1. BP OIL INTERNATIONAL LTD./AYM SHAFA LTD.
2. VITOL SA/CALSON-HYSON
3. TOTSA TOTAL OIL TRADING SA/TOTAL NIG. PLC
4. GUNVOR INTERNATIONAL B.V./AY MAIKIFI OIL & GAS CO. LTD.
5. TRAFIGURA PTE LTD./A. A. RANO NIG. LTD
6. CEPSA S.A.U./OANDO PLC
7. MOCOH SA/MOCOH NIG. LTD.
8. LITASCO SA/BRITTANIA-U NIG. LTD./FREEPOINT COMMODITIES
9. MRS OIL & GAS COMPANY LTD
10. SAHARA ENERGY RESOURCE LTD
11. BONO ENERGY LTD./ETERNA PLC/ARKLEEN OIL & GAS LTD./AMAZON ENERGY
12. MATRIX ENERGY LTD./PETRATLANTIC ENERGY LTD./UTM OFFSHORE LTD./LEVENE ENERGY DEVELOPMENT LTD
13. MERCURIA ENERGY TRADING SA/ BARBEDOS OIL & GAS SERVICES LTD./RAINOIL LTD./PETROGAS ENERGY
14. ASIAN OIL & GAS PTE LTD./ EYRIE ENERGY LTD./ MASTERS ENERGY OIL & GAS LTD/CASIVA LTD
15. DUKE OIL COMPANY INCORPORATED.
The contract is for one year effective October 1, 2019, till September 30, 2020.
This is the first time the NNPC would be officially publishing the list of winners of the contract under the DSDP scheme since it began in 2016.
In his takeover note on July 8, 2019, Mr Kyari promised to open NNPC books to public scrutiny as part of a new commitment to transparency and accountability.
He said as a publicly owned company, Nigerians deserved to know about the operations and activities of the Corporation.
Reiterating his management’s team commitment to transparency and accountability during the launch of the team’s policy direction tagged: Transparency, Accountability, Performance and Excellence (TAPE), Mr Kyari had said the list would be published this month.
132 local and international bidders involved
On May 3, the NNPC had announced a list of 132 local and international firms that submitted bids for the 2019 DSDP crude oil contract.
During the bids opening exercise, the former GMD of the NNPC, Maikanti Baru, said the exercise was to ensure that qualified companies were engaged, shortlisted and awarded the lucrative contracts.
Prospective awardees, he said, were expected to possess the capacity to transport about 14 billion litres of products under the DSDP scheme.
Mr Kyari, then the Group General Manager (GGM) Crude Oil Marketing Division, NNPC, said each of the successful companies would be allocated some of the 445,000 barrels per day of Nigeria’s crude oil usually allocated for domestic refining.
Mr Kyari had said only companies with the capacity to utilise the allocated crude oil to supply petroleum products to the country would be considered for the contract award.
Eventually, some of the companies who bid individually coalesced together to form a consortium to emerge winners.
In his statement on Sunday, Mr Ughamadu said the 15 consortia/companies that emerged as winners followed the completion of the 2019/2020 DSDP contract tender exercise.
He said the winners were made up of reputable and experienced international companies and Nigerian downstream companies committed to successfully undertake supplies of petroleum products under the 2019/2020 DSDP arrangement.
Benefits of DSDP scheme
The DSDP scheme was introduced in 2016.
Since its inception, until March 2019, about 29.5 million metric tons (39.6 billion litres) of petroleum products were supplied under the scheme representing over 90 per cent of the national requirement.
Mr Ughamadu said the contract tender process comprised technical and commercial bid submission respectively, followed by the evaluation and shortlisting of the bidders, then commercial negotiations with prequalified companies and engagement of the successful consortia/companies by NNPC.
“Under the DSDP arrangement, the under listed fifteen (15) consortia/companies shall over the contract period, offtake crude oil and in return, deliver corresponding petroleum products of equivalent value to NNPC, subject to the terms of the agreement”, Mr Ughamadu said.
