RondosFloorball

Today, they are launching one of Kenya’s biggest white elephants: the Dangote Kenya refinery in Lamu. A 700,000-barrel-a-day plant that Kenyans may end up paying for long after the speeches are over. I have asked one question for a week. Still, no honest answer from UDA. Where will this refinery get 700,000 barrels of crude every day? Turkana is not the answer. Lokichar oil starts at about 20,000 barrels a day. Even if it rises to 50,000, that is still a tiny fraction of what this plant needs. Stop saying, “Our oil will feed it.” It will not. Uganda’s crude is already going through Tanzania. That route was chosen, and a refinery is on the cards. South Sudan’s oil already has a shorter and cheaper path to Port Sudan. No serious buyer will send it the long way through Kenya out of goodwill once the war is over. So this refinery must import almost all its crude. That is when the excuses begin. They say Nigeria imports too. Nigeria produces oil and sits on the Atlantic with a huge market, it only imports a little. Kenya does not. They say India imports too. India is next to Oman, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf. Kenya is far. Distance costs money. That is not politics. That is arithmetic. They can import and still sell at market prices. They say China and Japan import too. Those countries have industries that consume the fuel. Kenya is not industrialized at that scale. Importing for them makes economic sense; they aren't importing to sell again. They say a refinery also produces other products. Those are usually by-products. They do not save a plant that cannot lock in cheap, reliable crude at 700,000 barrels a day. This is how a white elephant works. Politicians get the ceremony. Contractors get the contracts. Land dealers get paid. Investors get protection. Kenyans get the bill when the project starts making losses. Some people say, “If Dangote is putting money in, it must work.” That is naive. He is not putting unprotected personal cash on the table. He is using investor money, debt, and a deal structured so that if the project collapses, Kenya becomes the backstop. He can recover and walk. Taxpayers stay. A refinery is not a monument. It is a machine. It lives or dies on cheap crude, cheap transport, and a market that can absorb the product at a profit. Kenya does not have those three things at this scale. I am not asking for noise. I am asking for proof. Show the 700,000 barrels. Show where they will come from. Show the price. Show who pays if it fails. If they cannot show that, this is not industrialization. It is a very expensive photograph. And if all you have is “you hate progress,” or insults, you are clueless.