Nigeria’s state hydrocarbon company NNPC Ltd has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with two Chinese companies, Sanjiang Chemical Company Limited and Xingcheng (Fuzhou) Industrial Park Operation and Management Co. Ltd, for collaboration through a potential Technical Equity Partnership (TEP) in support of the completion and operation of the Port Harcourt and Warri Refineries.
The potential framework would cover completion of outstanding work at the two refineries, together with operating and maintaining both facilities to achieve best-in-class, sustainable performance.
Bashir Bayo Ojulari, Group CEO NNPC Ltd, signed the MoU along with Guan Jianzhong, Chairman of Sanjiang Chemical Company and Bill Bi, Chairman of Xinganchen (Fuzhou) Industrial Park Operation and Management Co. Ltd, in Jiaxing City, China, on Thursday, April 30, 2026.
“Planned expansion and upgrades would elevate both facilities to cleaner, more profitable product standards. The potential collaboration also contemplates expanding the refineries’ petrochemical capacities and harnessing gas and downstream opportunities through the development of co-located, gas-based industrial hubs”, an NNPC statement said.
NNPC had spent over $2.5Billion on turn around maintenance of its three refineries (these two in MoU and a third in Kaduna, in the north of the country), between 2021 and 2025. Last February, the Mr. Ojulari described most of that effort as a waste.
Africa Oil+Gas Report has reported on NNPC’s extensive engagement with Chinese companies, noting that the Chinese would fund and run at least one of the plants, with NNPC being a non-operating, non-funding partner and that the shareholding structure will be determined after the technical terms have been fully agreed. These details were left out of NNPC’s May 4, 2026 statement on the MoU.
Instead, Ojulari comfirmed that the MoU execution was achieved after more than six months of concerted engagement between the technical and management teams of NNPC and the two Chinese partners, Sanjiang and Xinganchen.
“All parties recognise mutually beneficial opportunities for the development and long-term sustainable profitability of NNPC’s refining assets in Nigeria, and the collective weight required for success,” he noted.
NNPC’s Group CEO further stated that the MoU is an important step on the journey towards identifying potential technical equity partner(s) to restart and expand NNPC’s refineries, and to explore opportunities in co-located petrochemicals and gas-based industries.
“The MoU reflects the parties’ shared intent to progress discussions in good faith, with any definitive arrangements to follow in due course and subject to customary approvals”, the statement concluded.
