The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) has issued a warning about the impending fuel scarcity nationwide.
On Friday in llorin, the capital of Kwara State, Alh. Okanlawon Olanrewaju, IPMAN’s National Public Relations Officer, expressed concern over the steep prices set by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) for marketers.
He revealed that NNPC plans to sell fuel to marketers at N1,010 per litre, a price that exceeds what the corporation charges at its own outlets, raising fears of another fuel crisis.
“The problem IPMAN is facing in the downstream oil sector is confounding. We realised that what NNPC is imposing on us is too much. NNPCL is the sole off-taker from Dangote Refinery and the amount the NNPCL wants to sell to us is too high.
“NNPC wants to sell at N1,010 to IPMAN. This price is even higher than what NNPCL sells at its retail outlets after including transportation cost. That’s a very difficult situation they are putting us.
“We may not be able to survive in that kind of situation because we’ll have to sell to same members of the public. Definitely, it’s like they want to tag us as bad marketers,” he said.
Describing the situation as unacceptable the IPMAN spokesman said that, “We don’t really know why they are doing that but definitely, we’ll not accept it. It won’t work.
“Presently, our members have paid a lot of money about N15 billion into NNPCL account for months and they’ve not given us the product. This is for about two to three cargoes at the old price of N750 per litre. And now they want to increase the price after about three or four months.
“They’ve asked us to top up the money paid to them before we pick the product. That’s what they have been doing always. We cannot continue doing that. Our president has instructed that every member of IPMAN should stay put until further notice as we’ll be having our NEC meeting on Wednesday next week. It means that marketers will not pay that money until our discussion,” he said.
Olanrewaju, who agreed that the directive by leadership of the association to marketers could lead to non-availability of fuel in circulation, said it would likely lead to disruption of fuel distribution, “because by the time we don’t pick product for sometimes and we start exhausting what we have, definitely, there’s going to be scarcity”.
