The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has stated that the truck out of 1,300 truckloads of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) also known as petrol from its depots daily, has helped to clear the current fuel scarcity witnessed across the country.
Managing Director, Petroleum Products Marking Company (PPMC), Dr Umaru Ajiya, disclosed this to newsmen on Wednesday while monitoring various filling stations in Abuja.
The filling stations visited were Oando Plc., Mabushi, Total filling station in Wuse Zone 3, Conoil Plc., in the Central Business District and AYM Shafa in Apo district.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that there were minimal queues in some of the stations while some had normal sales to customers.
“As you can see in all the stations we went, they have products and there are no longer queues in the stations.
“Essentially, this is the product of a lot of hardwork and effort between ourselves and sister agencies, Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) and the security agencies by rising up to the challenge.
“We have moved our operations to 24 hours in all our depots; we have moved ourselves to all our affiliate stations for 24 hours. Similarly, our majors have done so in Abuja to complement our effort.
“In addition to that, we have massively increased our truck out, we cover 1,300 trucks a day as you can see them arriving in several stations,’’ he said.
He noted that with the collaboration of the DPR, PPPRA and security agencies, surveillance and monitoring had been beefed up adding that the NNPC had directed that any depot or filling station found hoarding product should be sold to Nigerians free of charge.
He further debunked the allegation of the planned increase of pump price by NNPC and reassured Nigerians that there were adequate products in the country.
“Nigerians should calm down, they do not need to rush to buy products and hoard; it is also unsafe to keep such products in their houses.
“We have a robust supply plan, every blessed day, we have a minimum of one ship arriving Nigeria, today, we receive two ships, tomorrow we have a ship, the day after tomorrow, we have two ships, that’s the trajectory going forwards until the end of the year.
“One ship has an average of 50 million litres and the average consumption in Nigeria is about 35 million liters,’’ he added.
Also, Chief Operating Officer, NNPC Ventures, Dr Victor Adeniran, reiterated that the collective effort of the various agencies and the security agencies contributed to the positive result witnessed in the country.
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We made that promise, and as you can see, we have delivered. In addition to that, as the MD PPMC just said, we have a robust plan to take us to the end of the year. And that is what we have been working on.
“Our hands are still on deck and we are looking at everything as it comes everyday so that the situation like this can continue in Lagos, Abuja and all over the country,’’ he said .
On tackling the black marketers roaming the streets, he said that the men of Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps had been arresting some of them anywhere they see them.
“That is the plan that we have put in place. For me, what is important is when you have the products everywhere, they would disappear,’’ he added.
He assured that the goal of the corporation was to ensure that products were available to Nigerians always.
“That is our goal and that is what we are working towards,’’ he added.
(NAN)
