Nigeria’s state-owned oil company, NNPC, on Monday said it has deployed more of its depots and other throughput facilities to enforce the N133.28 per litre Ex-Depot price of Premium Motor Spirit, otherwise known as petrol, to marketers directly.
This was said in a press statement signed by Ndu Ughamadu, the group general manager, Public affairs division as the measure became necessary to resolve the price differentials between some of its stakeholders.
Assuring Nigerians that the corporation has maintained an adequate supply of petrol, Umar Ajiya, PPMC Managing director noted that the throughput facilities along with some of its coastal depots would go a long way in ensuring that marketers access PMS at the approved government price.
“As at today, I want to confirm that the NNPC/PPMC has more than 20 days sufficiency both at marine and land depots and we are still operating 24 hours at the depots and all NNPC Retail Outlets to wet the nation with PMS,” Ajiya reassured.
He added that the corporation received between one and two PMS laden ships per day, adding that there were days that the NNPC/PPMC took delivery of four cargoes of the ship laden with petroleum products.
The MD PPMC stated that queues were easing out across the country going by feedbacks from the field and that most of the filling stations were selling at the approved price of N145 per litre.
Nigerian annual inflation at 15.37% in December
He said the daily truck-outs from the depots had been increased from 1,733 trucks to 2000 trucks per day, adding that efforts are on to sustain the tempo in order to flood the market with PMS.
However, the MD, PPMC called on marketers to desist from hoarding and diversion of petroleum products to neighbouring countries, stressing that the corporation was working hand-in-hand with the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) and other security agencies to sanction defaulting marketers.
Nigeria, the biggest oil producer in Africa still grapples with the challenge of fuel scarcity across the country, as the scarcity continued to bite harder, majorly due to the dilapidated state of its domestic refineries performing so badly compared with other nations and the caps on its domestic prices, according to industry experts.
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation is looking for investment in an effort to revive its industry and achieves 90 percent utilisation of the plants by 2019, exceeding even the U.S., giving the country a mountain to climb after the monthly rate fell as low as 6.3 percent in September.
