Fuel sells for N170 per litre in Lagos, N200 in Jos, N600 in Abuja
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Muhammadu Buhari is missing in action – enjoying himself in a luxury hotel in far away Brussels – as fuel scarcity bites harder at home and threatens to ground social and economic activities with no guarantee of when this latest affliction will end.
A keg of 10 litres sells for N6,000 in the black market in Abuja, Niger, and Nasarawa; meaning N600 per litre. It costs N170 or more per litre in some filling stations in Lagos, N200 in Jos, and N250 in Port Harcourt.
The official rate is between N162 and N165 per litre.
Across the country, some drivers queue up overnight or in the wee hours of the day to get petrol in the few stations still open. Other stations shut down to avoid dispensing adulterated fuel or to create queues and cash in by raising pump price.
Buhari clearly an irresponsible man
Buhari is both President and Petroleum Minister of Nigeria, the largest oil producer in Africa, but he bolstered his image of being an irresponsible man on Tuesday when he flew off to Brussels for another meaningless parley in the midst of fuel chaos.
By the time he returns on Saturday, he would have wasted another five days overseas pretending to attend to international matters when there is a plethora of urgent problems for him to solve in his backyard.
Fuel price is rising along with transport fares to produce multiplier effects on the prices of other goods and services, all riding on fuel scarcity caused by importation of adulterated petrol.
Apart from rising prices of fuel and transportation, there are other pressing matters begging for Buhari’s attention.
He needs to assent to the Electoral Amendment Bill.
He needs to probe the National Assembly where legislative aides protested again on Tuesday over the stealing of funds and non-payment of salaries.
Buhari needs to probe the police for protecting Abba Kyari, the suspended Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) wanted in the United States over money laundering, and is also now busted as a drug trafficker in Nigeria.
No single European leader scheduled for the EU-AU summit in Brussels would have shown up in person, preferring to send a representative, if the multilayered crises currently engulfing Nigeria had occurred in his own country.
PDP asks Buhari to step down as Petroleum Minister
The Peoples Democratic Party has asked Buhari to step down as Petroleum Minister and called for the sack of Petroleum Minister of State Timipre Sylva.
PDP National Publicity Secretary Debo Ologunagba said in a statement the administration of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is pushing Nigerians to the streets in protest against its “continued arrogance, corruption, and insensitivity to the feelings of the people.”
__________________________________________________________________
Related articles:
Petroleum Minister Buhari shifts fuel palaver blame on others
Buhari ignores yearly $4b oil theft, insists on taking loans
Under Buhari, even lawmakers are stealing billions, says ICPC
__________________________________________________________________
Many filling stations closed
Many filling stations are not dispensing petrol, paralysing mobility across the country.
In Abuja, Lagos, Rivers, Bayelsa, Kwara, Nasarawa, Niger, Kano, Ogun, among others, queues by motorists greet very limited number of filling stations that sell fuel, according to a survey conducted by The PUNCH.
The mayhem, caused by imported adulterated petrol about two weeks ago, has led to a hike in pump price in all states, with black marketers cashing in, and transport fares skyrocketing.
Many small businesses are grounded because their owners cannot get petrol to run power generators.
Oil marketers announced plans to blend petrol since the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) has not recalled all the contaminated products.
The NNPC said it is working hard to address scarcity as over 2.3 billion litres of refined petrol will arrive in the country before the end of February.
“As of today [Tuesday], the NNPC has over one billion litres of petrol in stock, and the PMS being dispensed today at the various filling stations in the country is safe,” the NNPC explained in a statement issued in Abuja.
Despite the promise, fuel queues persist everywhere.
Plateau
The price of petrol has risen to between N175 and N200 per litre in the few filling stations that sell the product in Jos.
Many commuters are stranded because very few commercial vehicles operate.
A motorist, Giwa Johnson, said he spent more than eight hours on the queue to buy fuel at a filling station on Yakubu Gowon Way in Jos, describing his experience as terrible.
Benue
Most fuel stations in Makurdi have no fuel and black marketers have taken over the streets.
There are long queues at Jenny, Gabrow, and Rain Oil stations in the metropolis but some other stations are closed.
A motorist who identified herself as Charity said she was on the queue at Jenny filling station for two hours before she could get fuel.
Kwara
Most commercial and private vehicles are off the road with commuters stranded.
The few filling stations that dispense fuel in Ilorin are jam-packed and transport fares have increased 300 per cent for intra-city journeys and doubled for inter-city.
Ogun
Residents and traders in Abeokuta and other parts of the state lament the hardship over the scarcity of fuel. Most filling stations are either shut or raise pump price
Many residents complained they could not carry out their business activities due to the scarcity, which has also forced increases in transport fares and commodities.
Rivers
Petrol sells for N250 per litre in some filling stations in Port Harcourt with long queues in the few outlets that dispense products.
Few vehicles are on the road, fares have gone up, and commuters resort to trekking to their destinations.
Bayelsa
Some petrol stations along the busy Mbiama-Yenagoa Road and Isaac Boro Expressway are shut. Consumers suspect they are hoarding fuel.
A few black markets on Isaac Boro Expressway sell a 10-litre jerrycan of fuel for N2,000 and 20 litres for N4,000.
TUC, NLC may embark on strike
Both Trade Union Congress (TUC) President Quadri Olaleye and Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) official Emmanuel Ugboaja said their unions are engaging with stakeholders on the move.
“At the moment, we are watching, we are monitoring and doing some engagements for us to be able to make emergency decisions. When Labour takes an emergency decision, you know what it means? It is either strike or protest,” Olaleye said
“You can see that even what they are using to investigate the man-made problem is part of the funds made for Nigerian workers. So we are monitoring and when it is time to take a decision we would.”
Ugboaja confirmed that “we are still consulting with NUPENG [Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers], which is one of our affiliates.
“We are expecting them to brief the leadership of the union, afterwards, the union would determine the next step to take.”
Depot and Petroleum Products Marketers Association of Nigeria (DAPPMAN)
“We have worked assiduously with the regulatory authorities from the onset to curtail the further distribution of the off-spec fuel in all DAPPMAN depots and retail outlets,” DAPPMAN disclosed in a statement.
“DAPPMAN also seconded versatile professionals to the Technical and Commercial Committees set up by the regulators and stakeholders who have initiated best practices ‘Standard Operating Procedures’ to ensure not only that the off-spec products are quarantined, professionally processed, tested and certified good for distribution to the market.
“But we are also working with NNPC Ltd through its subsidiary, the PPMC Ltd, to ensure that adequate stocks of ‘on-spec’ petrol are made available to Nigerians in all nooks and crannies of the nation.”
NNPC seeks damages from suppliers
NNPC Group Managing Director Melee Kyari apologised to Nigerians for the hardship caused by adulterated fuel and promised that it will next week with efforts being made by to correct the anomaly.
He also disclosed that the NNPC is filing claims against suppliers of the substandard fuel and confirmed that Duke Oil, an NNPC subsidiary, shares in the blame.
“Our suppliers bring products to us and reconcile with them regularly. Part of those supply arrangements is to give specifications to your suppliers” Kyari told House of Representatives members investigating the fuel problem in Abuja.
“There was simply no way, based on the current specification, that you will know this PMS contains methanol. It is not part of their requirements at the load port. So, we did not ask them to declare whether it contained methanol because it is not part of our specification.
“What we have done is that we put all our suppliers on notice that there will be liquidated damages.”
