Kenya President William Ruto has visited the $20 billion Dangote Refinery in Lagos ahead of the groundbreaking ceremony for the Dangote East African Refinery in Lamu, Kenya, scheduled for 30th September.
In his remarks, he stated that his administration will expedite all necessary actions to facilitate the smooth takeoff of the 700,000 barrels per day capacity Refinery by removing administrative bottlenecks.
The Kenyan president’s second visit to Nigeria on September 25th, 2026, marked more than 10 years since his first visit as Deputy President of Kenya. He described the visit to Dangote Refinery as firsthand knowledge that has rejuvenated his investment confidence in the timely execution of the project.
He disclosed that he had previously seen several presentations and brochures about the proposed project, but visiting the refinery offered a clearer picture of what such an investment could deliver.
“I just want to tell the Dangote family here that the government of Kenya is one hundred per cent behind your project, our project. We have already secured the land necessary for this.
“We are working on all the other enablers to make sure that we don’t spend time on doing administrative bureaucratic stuff. We spend time on doing what we must do so that at the earliest opportunity we can refine products out of Lamu in Kenya,” Ruto stated.
Chairman of the Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, in his remarks, disclosed that the new Lamu Refinery will be an upgraded version of Nigeria’s Dangote Refinery with the installation of some latest features that are not currently incorporated in the Lekki Refinery in Nigeria.
“We will have some of the equipment that we have here, maybe like the RFCC, but it will be much heavier. And then you also have the coker, which we don’t have here, because of the type of crude that we have. And we also have VDU, which we also don’t have here,” Dangote said.
“So, this will give you a sense of an idea of what we are going to have in Kenya. But Kenya will be a little bit bigger than what you are going to see,” Dangote added.
The Dangote East African Oil Refinery in Lamu, Kenya, is estimated to cost between $16 billion and $17 billion, with an additional estimate of $ 4 billion to $ 3 billion for the broader petrochemical complex and port infrastructure.
