SONARA impresses Governor during tour

The Management of the lone Oil Refining Company, SONARA has impressed Governor Bernard Okalia Bernard in its activities and successes.

The visibly happy Governor spent close to 4 hours at SONARA during his socio economic tour to Fako Division.

The Governor was received on behalf of the General Manager by top management staff led by the Technical Adviser to the General Manager, Evelyn Martins. Speaking at the SONARA conference hall, Evelyn Martins highlighted to the Governor some of the changes which Talba Malla, has initiated since he took over.

The Governor was made to recall that the General Manager was appointed by the Head of State, President Paul Biya, on February, 15, 2013, and installed the same day in the presence of the Governor.

Amongst the innovations made so far by the new General Manager, is the advancement of the first phase of the expansion project.

According to Evelyn Martins “The first phase of the extension project needed to be finalized” so that there will be an “increase the production capacity and profitability of SONARA,”

Dr Derrick Takere, told the Governor that this first phase of the project will be completed by October, this year.

He stated that works on construction of the mechanical units or installations for the first phase are expected to be complete by March. But that between March and September the construction engineers will progress to connect the new units to the rest of the Refinery and, during this time, they will also carry on tests to ensure their workability.

Dr Takere went on to state the goals aimed to be achieved by this of this expansion project which he stated were to, among other things, enable SONARA to increase its production capacity from the current 2.1 million tons to 3.5 million per year of petroleum products.

It should be noted that at this point in time SONARA refines crude oil with a good percentage gotten from outside.

But by October 2015, when the first phase must have been completed, SONARA shall be producing more of crude oil bought from Cameroon and the CEMAC countries and less of it from other countries such as Nigeria.

Speaking about what has already been realized for the first phase, Takere said new tanker parking lot has been constructed which can take about 100 oil tankers at a time and that a new blast proof control room is already in place, a new storage tank for crude oil has been built and several others for the preservation of finished products also in place.

Dr Takere stated that with the expansion, a new gas flare terminal will be constructed, their water and electricity production plants will have to be expanded, too and other installations still have to be put in place. A Hydro cracking unit, he said, is being planned for the second phase.

Ngome noted that the SONARA expansion project is Cameroon’s largest project in terms of size and financing.

The Governor, in response, thanked the Management of SONARA under the leadership of Ibrahim Talba Malla and caution them to take their work seriously especially in the present year.

The Governor and his delegation it should be noted had a site visit round the Oil Complex spending some good time at the construction site of the expansion project.

The Governor equally noted that SONARA is a strategic target for terrorist attacks hence they should make sure they protect the company from the enemies while counting of the state as guarantor of peace.

The satisfied Governor said his purpose of visit was to know and understand how the project was moving and to find out some of their difficulties and see how solutions can be gotten.

He noted that SONARA which provides the Cameroon and international markets with finished products such as cooking gas, jet fuel, super gasoline, kerosene among others has a very strategic role to play as far as fuelling or providing the fuel that Cameroon needs for its huge projects and wellbeing.

He left SONAR satisfied and promising that Government will continuously support the company since it is the pride of the nation.