NIGERIAN oil marketers have shifted the blame of fuel scarcity being experienced across the states in the country to the #EndBadGovernance protest which started five days ago, despite many filling stations being under lock and key for many weeks in several cities in the country.
In a statement seen by The ICIR on Monday, August 5, the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) claimed the hunger protest was responsible for the resurgence of long fuel queues in filling stations in major cities across the country.
The IPMAN’s National Public Relations Officer (PRO), Chinedu Ukadike, said there was no movement of trucks during the protests, especially on Thursday and Friday, August 1 and 2 respectively.
“Now that the trucks are no longer moving due to this protest, the depots are not working, the truck drivers are not driving, particularly during the first and second days of the protest, these issues have disrupted the supply of petroleum products. So it will result in scarcity at the filling stations,” Ukadike stated.
The youth-led demonstration against hardship in the country started on Thursday, August 1, which is barely one week and has been relatively peaceful in southern states, especially in Lagos State, where petroleum products are mainly loaded and transported to other parts of the country.
Fuel queues started to build up in some filling stations in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) on Friday, July 26. Motorists were seen engaging in panic buying, as most filling stations closed shops and a few hiked their pump prices.
Responding to the resurgence of the long queues, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) blamed it on a “hitch in the discharge operations of a couple of vessels,” The ICIR reported on July 27.
On July 25, The ICIR reported that fuel scarcity hit most of the NNPCL filling stations as marketers anticipated products from Dangote Refinery.
The ongoing fuel scarcity started on July 5 when it resurfaced in Abuja and spread to other states, including Lagos. The NNPCL had said it was caused by flooding and logistics challenges.
Specifically, the NNPCL said the flooding disrupted the ship-to-ship transfer of petrol between mother vessels and daughter vessels, and weather conditions affected berthing at jetties, truck load-outs and transportation of products to filling stations, disrupting supply to filling stations.
In a report on July 12, the IPMAN PRO told The ICIR that NNPCL’s supply to oil marketers was still a bit slow and affected by higher demands for the products.
“NNPCL is giving products to marketers. There are still issues around epileptic distribution which shows that the supply hiccups are not sorted. It is taking longer before the products get to the marketers. We are not fully independent as we are still dependent on the products supplied to us by the Federal Government through NNPCL,” Ukadike said.
The ICIR observed a few queues on Monday, August 5, at the filling stations that opened for operations in Lagos.
At the NNPCL stations at Ojodu Berger, the queues were minimal and selling at a pump price of N568.
However, several filling stations have hiked their pump prices, selling above N700 to over N800 per litre, while other filling stations have been under lock and key for weeks.