We Have No Money To Import Fuel – Marketers
There are indications that the current fuel scarcity may not
abate unless the Federal Government pays the outstanding
N200m reportedly being owed the oil marketers as subsidy
claims.
The oil marketers, who confirmed to our correspondent that
they had stopped importation, said they could not continue
with fuel importation as result of inadequate funds.
They spoke through the Executive Secretary, Major Oil
Marketers Association of Nigeria, Mr. Obafemi Olawore.
Olawore, along with the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and
Natural Gas Workers, also denied the report that they were on
strike.
He said they were still waiting for the Federal Government to
call them to another roundtable on how to pay the N200bn
fuel subsidy owed them.
Olawore said, “We are not on strike. People are just painting
us the way they want. We are not importing because we don’t
have the money to buy the products. The government has not
invited us. The only thing we have heard is the resolution of
the Senate on Thursday and I think that they are going to
invite us soon.”
Out of N356.2bn subsidy the government reportedly owed oil
marketers, the Ministry of Finance paid the sum of N156bn
about two weeks ago.
With about five days to the handover of power to a new
administration at the federal level, tanker drivers in the
country have also stopped lifting fuel from the depots,
leaving many filling stations without the product and others
selling at exorbitant prices.
The General Secretary, NUPENG, Mr. Isaac Aberare, said
tankers drivers would start lifting the product as soon as they
received the directive to do so, insisting that they were not
strike.
He said, “If there are products in the depots, we will go there
and load. Remember that the Lagos State Government gave
tankers drivers 48 hours to leave the road instead of clogging
the whole road and making navigation difficult; we have
complied with that instruction. Any time there are products,
we will go and load.”
In its response to the lingering fuel scarcity in the country,
the Senate on Thursday directed its Committee on Petroleum
Resources (upstream and downstream) to commence a full
investigation into the causes of the persistent fuel crisis.
The directive was made following a motion by the Deputy
Senate Majority Leader, Senator Abdul Ningi.
Ningi said, “We need to know whether fuel scarcity has come
to stay. We need to know whether it has become part of our
lives. We need to plan.
“By planning and talking about it, we are now sensitising
Nigerians to brace for the impending issue of fuel scarcity
whether it is going to be here permanently or it is temporary.”
