Although, Petrol scarcity has become Nigeria’s familiar, a tolerable evil whose hardship the populace absorbs with grumbling resignation, the tribulation of December 2017 rankles Nigerians so much it stretches their endurance to the breaking point. In the last one week, the populace has been venting its pent-up frustration, with many unreservedly pronouncing the 2017 Yuletide the most cheerless so far in their lifetime.
The scarcity nightmare shook the government to the extent that the Vice President, Prof Yemi Osibajo, took to the streets of Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory, to monitor the situation.
Three days to the end of the year, despite all measures employed, the status quo prevails. Instead of abating, fuel scarcity bites harder as the country inches closer to the New Year.
Dr Maikanti Baru, Group Managing Director of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) on Friday, December 29, assured that the situation is under control.
“As of this morning, I have gone round the Abuja metropolis and I have seen that the queues have reduced significantly to almost normal level. So the monster has been tamed in Lagos, the situation has been brought into normalcy as far as two days ago.”
He further assured: “As at yesterday, (Thursday, Dec 28), we loaded 1,750 trucks to go around the country. So we will continue massive load out until we reached the former position whereby all the stations will have products.”
The story from the street, across Nigerian cities, is a stark contrast. For instance, in Kano State, where independent marketers were the major source of petroleum products, a price regime of N220 to N225 per litre prevails with the situation forcing many tricycle operators, popularly known as “Yan’adaidaita,” temporarily out of business.
Hard-tackling hoarders
In the morning of Friday, December 29, the few tricycles plying the road hiked their fares by 70 percent, charging between N150 and N200, instead of N100 on intra-city routes. For example, commuters paid between N250 and N300 instead of N200 from Rijiyar Zaki to Sabon Gari.
Isa Umar, a tricycle operator who spoke with Saturday Sun, claimed the shortage has affected his him adversely to the extent that he was operating at a loss. “Usually, I fill my tricycle’s tank with N1, 000, but now, I fill up with N1, 700, and I hardly recover my money. I prefer to buy fuel from black market because you will not waste time,’’ he said.
The NNPC GMD Maikanti Baru had disclosed the corporation still sells at N143 per litre to independent marketers, who are expected to sell at N145 per litre maximum.
President Muhammadu Buhari, in ordering a clamp down on marketers who flout the regulatory price, gave the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) and relevant security agencies the fiat to seal off fuel stations found to be hoarding petroleum products and dispense such petroleum free to the public.
A Saturday Sun reconnaissance of Jos, Plateau State capital, found only the NNPC Mega Station and Rito Filling Station in Bukuru complying with the official pump price of N145 per litre. The NNPC Mega Station was besieged by motorists, who even passed the night in order to get the commodity.
However, the DPR operation yielded result as Basaco Filling station at Dadin-Kowa and some at Zaramanga, Rayfield Road hitherto selling petroleum at N210 were forced by DPR to drop the price down to N145.
Mark Julius, DPR official who led a monitoring team within Jos Bukuru metropolis on Thursday, Dec 28 confirmed to Saturday Sun that not less than 20 filling stations had been sealed for selling the product above the official price.
Said he: “The situation is improving, the long queues are dropping down gradually and this is because we have been sealing filling stations that have the product and are not selling, those who has but claimed to have faulty pumps and does that are selling above the official pump price of N45 per litre were all sealed.”
Julius said further: “We have sealed more than 20 filling stations that are defaulting and we do not intend to open these stations until the situation improve.”
According to him, erring stations were further sanctioned to serve as deterrence to others who might want to indulge in a similar action.
In Kaduna State, DPR officials also suspended three filling stations for three months for under-dispensing petrol to motorists. The three filling stations––Mamu Oil, Fasada Petroleum Company Nig. Ltd and FARMSKAN Petroleum Company––are all located along the Kaduna-Zaria highway.
This was even as they were forced by DPR officials to immediately dispense the hoarded fuel to motorists at government-approved price of N145 per litre.
Isah Tafida, DPR Zonal Controller (Northwest), disclosed to newsmen that, discovered hoarded at were 8,300, 4,500 and 7,400 litres––a total of 17,700 litres of petroleum products––at Mamu Oil, Fasada, FARMSKAN filling stations respectively.
A number official from monitoring groups, such as the Executive Director Services, Kaduna Refining and Petro-chemical Company (KRPC), Mallam Abdullahi Idris, and the Kaduna State Commander, Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC), also joined DPR operatives to arrest the situation in Kaduna State.
In Rivers State DPR officials, accompanied by personnel of the Department of State Service (DSS) and Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), sealed five filling stations in
Port Harcourt. The stations fell foul of the law for various sharp practices including diversion and hoarding of petrol products.
Notice of Penalty was issued to Conoil filling station within Ikwoku Junction along Ikwerre Road for under-dispensing and hoarding of product, while Chinda Petroleum Limited, around Mile Three axis of Ikwerre Road, was shut down for hoarding and over-pricing. MRS filling station, which is said to have received 33,000 litres of petrol, was sealed for diversion of product.
In the case of Biddel filling station, located along Iwofe-UOE Road, selling above approved pump price and use of digital remote to manipulate the pump were the reasons for its shutdown.
Restopark, along Odili Road, guilty of flouting the approved pump price was forced to dispense fuel to motorists before it was sealed. Similarly, Jet Super Kiosk and Tonnino, along Ada-George Road, were sealed for selling a litre of fuel for N250.
Ibani Frank-Briggs, confirmed that over 35 filling stations across the Rivers State, received petrol product yesterday, told newsmen that officials of the Civil Defence have been directed to go after filling stations who habitually sell petroleum products only at night, disclosing that filling stations, sealed for the second time, would definitely not reopen till after six months.
NNPC-DAPPMA standoff
NNPC Baru had blamed marketers for the present fiasco. According to him, rumours alleging a looming hike in fuel price “instigated a lot of marketers to decided to profiteer starting by hoarding and diversion of products.”
He alleged: “At the beginning, I did address the press, telling the world that we have sufficient products that will last us 30 days through the new year into January but because the marketers wanted to inflict harm and pains on fellow citizens, they decided to hoard products, divert them and in some cases even smuggle products out of the country.”
He succinctly explained the current dynamics thus: “If NNPC sold it to you at N133.28, you have sufficient margin within that ambit to be able to supply and sell to the public at maximum N145 per litre. The NNPC mega stations are selling at N143 per litre so you should be able to sell at N145 per litre.”
Oil marketers, under the banner of Depot and Petroleum Products Marketers Association (DAPPMA) refuted the claim that its members were responsible for hoarding and sabotaging government’s efforts in solving the scarcity nightmare. Its Executive Secretary, Olufemi Adewole, in turn, accused the corporation of inadvertently created the nationwide scarcity.
Whereas the marketers own 80 percent of the functional receptive facilities and retail outlets in the country, NNPC has boycotted DAPPMA facilities of products nationwide to solely import and distribute fuel efficiently, despite its obvious deficiency.
“Our members’ depots are presently empty. However, if PPMC/NNPC can provide us with PMS, we’re ready to do 24-hour loading and trucking to alleviate the sufferings of Nigerians until these fuel queues are totally eliminated,” he said.
Adewole explained further: “While we cannot confirm or dispute NNPC’s claim of having sufficient product stock, we can confirm that the product is not in our tanks and as such cannot be distributed. “If products are offshore, then it cannot be considered to be available to Nigerians.” Further indicted: “NNPC regrets that DAPPMA whose members had taken receipts of products from Petroleum Products Marketing Company (PPMC), a subsidiary of NNPC and owe the company to the tune of N26.7billion as at December 21, 2017, has the audacity to indict NNPC unjustifiably.
“The statement by DAPPMA that the current hiccups in the supply of products was due to the inability of the Direct Sales Direct Purchase (DSDP) partners of NNPC to deliver on their business obligations is unfounded and self-indicting as many of DAPPMA members patronize the same DSDP international counterparts as the Corporation.”
DAPPMA’s rebuttal open can of worms, that the petroleum corporation owed its members N600 billion and other marketers like the Major Oil Marketers Association of Nigeria (MOMAN) over N800 billion.
“We again reject any attempt to blame marketers for the shortfall in supply, as it is not our making since NNPC has been the sole importer since October 2017,” Adewole had reiterated.
|Sun