Commuters groan as the gas pump price approaches N400/litre

Petrol consumers continued to groan under the burden of skyrocketing prices as Premium Motor Spirit reached nearly N400 a liter over the weekend.

The PUNCH market research over the weekend showed that while stations belonging to the Major Oil Marketers Association of Nigeria were selling products at around N190 per litre, stations belonging to members of the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria increased prices to between N320 and N340 per litre.

National Controller, Operations, IPMAN, said Mike Osatuyi The PUNCH on Sunday that price was unlikely to reach N400 per litre.

According to him, his members now buy products at N280/litre in depots.

President Buhari last week set up a 14-member commission he would lead to provide solutions to the ongoing fuel shortage.

Osatuyi announced that the commission will be inaugurated this week.

“With the way the president has put together the committee, Nigerians can expect something good. The committee will work with operators and stakeholders and they will call us for meetings where we will tell them what to do.

“If NNPC gives us products directly and we don’t have to go through third parties, prices will crash. IPMAN members account for 80 percent of the products on the market. So why don’t they give us products directly? Where MOMAN stations cannot go, our members are there! As of the weekend we bought the product for N280 per liter before adding transport now depending on the distance. So we sell at any price.

“You can quote me on this. NNPC subsidizes their pockets and not Nigerians. The subsidy they claim is in their pocket,” he said.

Osatuyi claimed that the state oil company began avoiding talks with oil traders and had left them to fend for themselves ever since.

According to him, NNPCL had failed the Nigerians because the company had no solution to the scarcity at all, adding that the new general manager of the NNPCL Retail, Hubbs Stockman, had not agreed to meet with them recently to discuss a solution to the petrol crisis.

He claimed that the president would not have established a steering committee if the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited had not failed in its responsibility to address the fuel shortage.

“There is currently confusion in the downstream sector as NNPCL has not been able to address the scarcity. There’s no fuel. Not even NNPCL has been able to import fuel because if they do, they will give it to us. Now the white man is avoiding us. He doesn’t want to touch us. How can you set up a system and still refuse to meet us for feedback? I don’t know what they are hiding from us. The white man is not open with us,” Osatuyi said.

Fuel scarcity has been ongoing since the last quarter of last year, with the price rising from N165 to over N300 per litre.

As of Sunday, there was still dense traffic congestion caused by motorists queuing to buy petrol on Lagos’ highways.

Black marketers were also seen making good money selling gasoline in barrels.

This is reported by sources at the depot The PUNCH that custodians raise prices based on the foreign exchange price per day.

“Do you follow black market forex at all? Because if you do, you would agree with me, that forex changes every day. If forex changes on a daily basis, landing costs will have to change as well,” the source told me The PUNCH when asked why ex depot petrol prices are rising daily.

Nigerian youths, under the auspices of the Nigerian Youth Congress for Peace and Development, had called on the president to dissolve the leadership of the Nigeria National Petroleum Company to address the country’s continued fuel shortage.

The youths, who lamented the suffering the Nigerian fuel shortage had caused, also called on the president to suspend all election processes to address the issue.

In a statement issued in Jos on Sunday and signed jointly by the president, Ebi Dennis and the secretary, Abdul Idi Ladduga, the youths also gave the president a two-week ultimatum to comply with their demands or to be ready to face protests from facing the Nigerian youth until the problems were resolved.

The statement read: “Nigerian Youth Congress for Peace and Development (NYCPD) is saddened by the unbearable level of artificial hardship Nigerians are subjected to as a result of fuel scarcity and the sudden tug in the price of Premium Motor Spirit by the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL).”

The group said the recent pump price adjustment was made without adequate consultation with relevant stakeholders in the oil and gas value chain.

“To our greatest surprise, His Excellency Chief Timipre Sylva, the Honorable Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, like other Nigerians, first heard about the price increase through rumor mills. That prompted him to issue a press statement through his media adviser, Mr. Horace Egua, denying the obvious fact of the adjustment and equally assuring Nigerians that President Muhammadu Buhari will not support the upward revision of the PMS price has approved. He further assured the Nigerians that the president has seen no reason why the price of the product should be raised.

According to the minister, “What is going on is the handiwork of troublemakers and those who intend to discredit Mr. President’s achievements in the oil and gas sector of the economy”

In response to the above, the team said it had delegated some of its members to visit the NNPCL store to ascertain the existing price of the product.

“To our great surprise, NNPCL has since adjusted their pump price, the same goes for all stations owned by Major Marketers. Numerous independent marketers sell it above N400 where it is available.

“What we have not understood is whether NNPCL no longer reports to the State Minister of Petroleum and Resources, who is the intermediary between them and Mr. President, who is the senior minister?

“Is NNPCL now in the hands of troublemakers and those who intend to discredit President Muhammadu Buhari?”

told Osatuyi The PUNCH that eliminating fuel subsidies and deregulation was key to solving the threat of fuel scarcity.

“The final solution is deregulation and the elimination of subsidies. Let the market be a free market where marketers other than the NNPC can bring in products. Since the government has said the subsidy will be phased out in June, we have to wait and see. But until then we have to make it,” he said The PUNCH Sunday on the phone.

Chairman, the Major Oil Marketers Association of Nigeria, Olumide Adeosun had in Lagos, also told journalists that deregulation of the downstream sector would eliminate fuel scarcity.

“After subsidizing PMS for so long, Nigerian institutions now have a reduced capacity to deal with the current local energy crisis. A failure in any part of the supply chain causes ripple effects and results in queues at stations. As a country, we must begin the process of price deregulation to reduce this inefficient subsidy,” he said.