January 20, 2023

Amid the lingering nationwide fuel scarcity, the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) on Friday said the volume of products supplied to marketers have dropped by about 40 percent.

IPMAN Deputy President, Zarma Mustapha, who made a live appearance on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily, said the country is in a complex situation owing to the “burden of subsidy that government is carrying”, which he said is no more sustainable.

According to him, the volume that the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), the sole importer of Premium Motor Spirit otherwise called petrol has been hitting hard on the “paucity of the funds” of the Federal Government.

“Because of that, the supply that we receive as marketers at the loading points, we believe we don’t get what we usually get – even 50 percent of what we get,” Mustapha said.

“Some [time] in July, August, the volume of liftings (sic) we had and what we have today has dropped by about 50 percent or 40 percent.”

The NNPC, on November 29, 2022, said it had a “national PMS stock of over 2 billion litres. This is equivalent to over 30 days of sufficiency”.

However, Mustapha theorised that the lingering presence of queues at fuel stations across the nation may be due to the high cost of subsidy.

“We are just assuming maybe the volume of the products they are bringing in – the more the volume, the more the cost of the subsidy,” he added.

“It doesn’t seem that they are bringing in more. If they’re bringing in more, we would be having the same volume that we usually get at the loading point.

“As of today, with what is trending (sic) in the private depots, the volume available is not enough. The private depots also contribute by not giving the product as it is being regulated by the NNPC.”

Price Hike
Mustapha pointed out that he had not heard any official statement from NNPC or the industry’s regulatory body, the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) about insufficient supply.

“But with the look of things, [with] what is going on at the loading point, the product is not enough as they usually bring it, supply it to the private depots and we purchase from the private depots,” he said.

According to the IPMAN deputy president, NNPC is saddled with importing the products and distributing them to private depots, adding that independent marketers do not have depots.

“Yesterday, I bought a product in Lagos at a depot at N247 per litre to be transported down to the far North at the cost of N50-N60 per litre. Even we as independent marketers don’t really understand what is happening.

“As of yesterday, it is going for about N240 in Lagos, N235 in Warri, and N240 in Port Harcourt. In Calabar, it’s as high as N250 per litre.

“As a marketer, you will buy that product for upward transmission to where your retail outlet is. You’ll transport it yourself,” he said.