The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) has blamed the recent queues around some retail outlets in the Federal Capital Territory(FCT) on the scarcity of the Premium Motor System(PMS) from the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPL).
Its National Vice President Alhaji Abubakar Maigandi disclosed this to The Nation on Tuesday.
He noted that the product was consequently scarce at the private depots where marketers loaded it.
Maigandi revealed that this has culminated in the hike of PMS from N148 to between N170 to N175 at the depots.
He also attributed the cause of the scarcity to the horrible condition of some of the Nigerian roads.
His words: “It is the condition of roads. Besides, NNPC doesn’t have enough products.
“There is a little scarcity in the depots where we are loading. They are even increasing their rates. Now they are selling N170 to N175/litre instead of N148/litre.”
The pump price approved for the FCT is N175 per litre, which may be a disincentive for the marketers to lift the product at the same price they would dispense it at the outlets.
But the IPMAN President, Alhaji Debo Ahmed, however, differed from Maigandi.
According to him, the scarcity was due to the weekend and Independence Day.
He noted that it is always typical for days after weekends and public holidays for petrol to be scarce.
The Nation check from the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) indicated that the NNPCL only had 1,580,679,808 litres, according to its latest stock data of 2nd October, 2022.
The data titled “Petroleum Products Stock and Days Sufficiency Report 2nd October 2022, showed that the stock would only be sufficient for 25.48 days.
