Mr Festus Osifo, President of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN), has given a reason for the ongoing fuel scarcity across the country, particularly in Lagos and Abuja.
Speaking during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily, Osifo highlighted the issue of ‘bridging funds’ between the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) and truck drivers who deliver the Premium Motor Spirits (PMS).
Osifo said, “The NMDPRA are the ones administering a bridging fund. At a particular time, they agreed with truck drivers that the bridging fund is going to be about N10 per litre depending on the destination you are going to all over the country.
“As at when they agreed, the cost of diesel was about N250, so it was fashionable and the N10 was a bit okay, but today, the cost of diesel is over N700. It has tripled. So, the expectation from the tanker drivers is that since the cost has gone up, instead of paying me N10.40kobo as the case may be, you’ve to multiply it by three.
“At the end of the day, that’s the first problem.”
“As of today, we’ve close to 2 billion litres of PMS, so the problem is not the stock,” Osifo said, explaining that while the stock is available, most of the truck drivers aren’t willing to move these products “because of the previous problem I just enumerated”.
“One of the issues again is that today, NNPC is the sole importer of PMS, so they import PMS into the country, and this PMS is brought to the high sea, so they rent some smaller vessels to bunker the PMS and take to the various tank farms or depots. So, if it is the NNPC depots and you’re loading from the NNPC depots, you’re going to pay about N148 as the ex-depot price. But some of the PMS are also stored in private depots and those private depots don’t sell to the retailers for 148; they add some premium to it, at the end the of the day, they sell between 152, 155, 160 and 162.
“So, if they sell at that amount, it’ll now be difficult for the retailer to go and sell at the same amount.”
from dailypost
May Nigeria never happen to anyone Amen. Everyone of us need to get our pvc. Enough is enough. Problems upon problems in this country
ReplyDeleteNigeria......Just one problem after the other. When will this END. Like we arent suffering enuf.
ReplyDeleteWe need solutions and results not speaking plenty English
ReplyDeleteNdi apari. Is this enough reason to cause hardship to the masses?. Something they could have deliberated since and reached an agreement. Tufiakwa. Nobody is talking about Asuu again.
ReplyDeleteJust say you want to increase and leave all this story. Increase your pump price to a reasonable amount and make it available. stop hoarding it, you are causing panic already and also creating hardship.
ReplyDeleteA government agency sets the maximum pump price and stations who were increasing their prices in alignment with reality were always reported and fined.
DeleteThat’s their own source of livelihood too so they shouldn’t take it lightly when they are obviously shortchanged.They have families to take care of and nobody has the monopoly of madness.
ReplyDeleteNigeria is blessed. It just mismanagement. A litre of petrol is equivalent of 900 naira in a country I live and work. A pray we vote good leaders in our next election.
ReplyDeleteAll petroleum is bought at that price internationally. That won't change when the Lagos refinery starts production as they will also be buying crude. Unless we stop kidding ourselves, the subsidy on petroleum has to go for the economy not to collapse or the maria dramatically weaken against the dollar. Painful but far better than the slow death option we have chosen.
DeleteDoes the country you live in have crude oil? How strong is their economy?. That 900 equivalent, I bet it can buy you chicken and vegetables. What can 900 naira buy you in Nigeria please?
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