Seven oil marketers who imported Premium Motor Spirit, popularly known as gasoline, around a month ago have ceased selling it, causing scarcity in some parts of the country.
According to sources on Friday, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited is currently the only importer of PMS, while various depots and filling stations are currently out of gasoline, resulting in long lineups at gasoline outlets.
According to Punch, the last private dealer, Petrocam, who just imported petrol into Nigeria, is unable to sell it because the product’s subsidy has been restored and the NNPCL has refused to raise the pump price.
Prior to last month, oil marketers told Punch that whenever they brought in the product, they would convince the NNPCL to boost the price to cover the landing cost.
This was because President Bola Tinubu had declared the suspension of petrol subsidy payments. As marketers began importation at the time, the commodity’s price was hiked twice to represent the true pump price.
However, in light of the country’s tough economic realities and labor union threats to ground the economy if petrol prices rose again, the government, through NNPCL, ceased raising the price of the product.
This caused the marketers to stop importing it, leaving just the NNPCL to do so.
However, the marketers explained that the NNPCL now had a large number of retail shops and was unable to meet their requests, let alone provide to third parties.
“The depots are dried up. That’s a statement of fact. For more than a month now, no other importer has brought in product except the NNPC,” a marketer, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to lack of authorisation, stated.
The National President, Natural Oil and Gas Suppliers Association of Nigeria, Benneth Korie, had earlier confirmed that a lot of depots were presently out of stock.
When asked if other marketers were actually bringing in the product alongside the NNPCL, the source (not Korie) replied, “Of course, yes. Emadeb started it.
“Nipco brought in products. About six to seven marketers brought in products. Petrocam also brought products. So, it wasn’t only NNPC.”
On whether marketers were breaking even considering the fact that subsidy had been reintroduced on petrol, the dealer said, “We were not breaking even. Rather, what the NNPC was doing was that they were able to help in price adjustments. First of all, when the situation started, each time marketers brought in products, they influenced the NNPC to change its price, and the moment NNPC changed its price, other marketers would follow.
“But for over a month now, I don’t think marketers have been able to influence the NNPC to change its price. So, that is why you hear that the landing cost currently is about N720/litre, but the NNPC is still selling at between N580 and N617, depending on your location.”
The source explained that the current price of petrol had been sustained because the government was subsidising the commodity.
“It (government) has said the price should not be more than that amount. So, for over a month now, no marketer has brought in the product due to the reintroduction of subsidy,” the source stated.
On whether NNPC has enough products to keep the country wet, since marketers have stopped PMS imports, the source replied, “The NNPC also has its challenges too. The NNPC you have now is different from the one before. If it was before, even if they bring in 10 million litres, they can give close to seven million litres to other marketers and utilise the rest.
“But now, even some of their retail outlets don’t have products because they are so many now. So, you cannot bring in products, you can’t be supplying third parties.”