ABUJA — Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) has appealed to Nigerians that fuel scarcity in the country will not go beyond next week.
The Managing Director of the Group of the NNPC, Mele Kyari, gave the assurance on Wednesday during a meeting with the House of Representatives ad-hoc committee investigating the importation of adulterated fuel into the country.
“For this current situation, let me assure you we have taken every necessary step to restore supply into this country. We have placed orders significant enough for us to cross into March, with at least 2.1 billion litres of PMS in our custody,” he said during the interaction.
“The situation you’re seeing today, I can assure you by next week, it will vanish. All things being equal, because of distribution issues that we may not have control over, including the movement of trucks, otherwise, we have robust supply arrangement to make sure we exit this situation.”
Kyari also appealed to Nigerians over the situation which has triggered fuel scarcity across the country. According to him, the development was not intentional.
“No one out there will bring this product into this country deliberately,” he said. “There is no way we would have seen this methanol except your supplier decides to disclose to you because it is not part of their requirements to look for this.”
Last week, the NNPC said the long queues were due to the importation of adulterated fuel into the country. The situation led to long queues in major cities as many struggled to get the product. Hoodlums have also reportedly taken advantage of the situation as millions of Nigerians queue for hours, staying late into the night to get fuel.
In Kaduna, residents, who lamented the situation, said they have resorted to patronizing black marketers who sell the product for as much as N1,000 per liter.
“I spent more than five hours following the line,” one of the residents, Abdulsalam Munir, told Channels Television.
“Since when I came, I haven’t gotten fuel and my car was on the line. Up till now (in the afternoon), I haven’t bought fuel. Even when you go to the black market, we buy one liter for N1, 000. So, fuel is very scarce and we are calling on the government to put an end to this thing.”
In the wake of the scarcity, the NNPC ordered its retail outlets to operate a 24-hour schedule to ameliorate the plight of Nigerians.
