Except Nigeria has its own operational refineries, there cannot be an end to the nation’s fuel crisis.
This is the submission of the Minister of State for Petroleum, Ibe Kachikwu.
The minister made the submission on Thursday when he appeared before a probe panel of the Senate over the lingering fuel crisis, which sat at the National Assembly in Abuja.
Kachikwu regretted the inability of the country to produce enough fuel for its citizens after over 35 years.
He said the method of having to sell crude, was quite abnormal.
His words: “I have said that selling crude is a fairly wrong model which is akin to selling our agricultural products in the wrong way and nobody does that anywhere in the world anymore.
“Unless we have operational refineries, there will be no permanent solution to the fuel crisis in the country.’’
Kachikwu however said the government was committed to bringing to life the country’s refineries in order to end the fuel crisis.
“The gearing up of private refineries and the modular refineries will complement the efforts of the government owned refineries to ensure there is adequate supply of petroleum products in the country,” said the minister.
Specifically addressing the current fuel crisis, the minister said the government had made good plans to make fuel regularly available.
He sympathised with Nigerians over the fuel crisis, saying that the problem arose as a result of price differentials between rise in price of crude oil and the cost in Nigeria.
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“Before you have both sides complementing each other because 100 per cent supply is demanding and people took advantage of the situation to perpetrate a lot of diversion.
“There is always a commercial reaction.
“The business module of fuel supply in the country is not yet where it should be but within the 18 months period expected to have the refineries work, we are working on how to accept benefits of crude price increase and ensure fuel sells at regulated price,’’ said the minister.
The Senate cut short its recess to address the problem of fuel crisis rocking the country.
The fuel crisis had been a subject of controversy between the government and oil marketers.
While the government blamed the marketers for the fuel crisis, accusing them of hoarding fuel, the marketers in turn blamed the government for inadequate supply of the product.
They also emphasized that the monopoly enjoyed by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, for the distribution of the product was responsible for the fuel scarcity.
