Despite being one of the world’s major crude oil producers, Nigeria has depended for decades on imports of refined petroleum products to meet its domestic energy needs. While Nigeria exports “Bonny Light,” a variant of “Light sweet crude oil” considered more desirable due to its low sulfur content, the refined petroleum Nigeria imports from Europe is more polluting and toxic than “black market fuel made from stolen oil in rudimentary “bush” refineries hidden deep in the creeks and swamps of the Niger delta,” as The Guardian put it. As far as absurd examples of dependency theory go, this is difficult to beat.

In light of this, it is understandable that some applause accompanied the announcement about a decade ago that Aliko Dangote, Nigeria’s billionaire cement magnate, and Africa’s richest man, had broken ground on a new mega-project to construct the continent’s largest crude oil refinery in Lagos.

Fast-forward to the present day. Following the government’s removal of petrol subsidies in mid-2023 and the intensification of an economic crisis that has left Nigerians reeling in the aftermath, many hoped that a reduction in energy costs would swiftly follow the announcement in mid-September that the first trucks laden with refined petrol had started leaving the Dangote Refinery.

Now, nearly a month later, fuel costs have not only remained high but continued to rise—amid a highly public spat between Dangote and Nigerian government officials—prompting confusion, conspiracy, and much questioning about why the Dangote Refinery has not saved Nigeria.

This episode, recorded amid the madness, attempts to make sense of the facts and fiction surrounding the refinery, the ever-spiraling price of petrol products, and the interaction between indigenous capitalist classes and the post-colonial state in Nigeria.

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