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From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
The Federal Government is to launch a probe into the importation of adulterated petrol into the country, Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Mr. Timipre Sylva has said.
This comes as the scarcity of petrol, which became noticeable two days ago, continued in Lagos and Abuja, with long queues characterising the few filling stations that still had products to sell despite assurances from the Nigerian Downstream Midstream Petroleum Authority (NMDPRA) that the trend would ease.
Findings by Daily Sun across filling stations in Lagos and Abuja yesterday revealed that the assurances from NMDPRA failed to yield the expected results as motorists and other consumers complained of not having east access to the product and spending hours at filling stations before being served.
The development has equally led to a slight increase in the cost of Transportation. A bus ride from Ikeja to Fagba which usually costs N250 has now moved to N300 while from Ikeja under bridge to GRA which hitherto costs N150 has now been jerked up to N200.
Some of the commuters in separate interviews expressed frustration at the sudden hike in transportation cost, urging the Federal Government to as a matter of urgency arrest the situation before it gets out of hand.
Also, the assurance by the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria(IPMAN) to consumers that fuel would be available from yesterday(Wednesday) proved unrealistic as queues at both independent and major fuel outlets persisted, yesterday.
Oil marketers have estimated that about 100 million litres of contaminated petrol were imported into country by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited.
However, Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, addressing State House Correspondents at the end of the Federal Executive Council meeting in Abuja, said the government would launch a probe to unravel the cause of the crisis.
He said the decision followed a briefing on the issue to President Muhammadu Buhari Tuesday with the aim of getting to the bottom of the matter.
Speaking after the meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) presided over by President Buhari at the presidential villa, Abuja, Sylva cautioned against drawing conclusions before the investigation is completed.
“The issue did not come up in council, but of course, you will recall I was here yesterday to brief Mr. President on the issue. I’m not in a position to disclose the identities of the companies, but there are some issues and we are actively tackling it. Nobody has, before now, checked for methanol in our fuel, it’s not very usual and this is the first time this is happening and NNPC is very much up to the task.
“I will also convey your question to NNPC and maybe the Midstream and Downstream Regulatory Authority, but we’re actively handling it and I want to assure you that the problem will be a thing of the past very soon.”
Sylvia also assured that the government would consider compensating those who may have been adversely affected by the bad fuel.
On possible sanctions for the erring companies, he said: “I didn’t expect you to rush to any conclusions. There’ll be a major investigation to unravel everything and then let’s really get to the bottom of it before we can come back and tell you what is going to happen to the culprits. We know that some people’s vehicles must have also been damaged, that is also going to be taken into consideration in dealing with the situation.”
The Minister of State had also spoken on the approval granted to his ministry by the council, saying FEC closed out the contract for the construction of the 17 storey local content building in Yenagoa at the cost of N1.817 billion.
Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola, on his part said the council granted approval made by the Advisory Committee on Nigeria citizenship for 286 foreign nationals out of 600 applications received.
He said 208 of those approved were granted citizenship by Naturalisation, while 78 others were granted citizenship by registration.
He said the persons approved by council cut across various countries of the world.
Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, said FEC approved a contract for the replacement of Aviation Operations (AvO) at the cost of N12,097,215,800 billion.
“So, today in Council, a memo was presented by us in aviation. And the amount of the contract to awarded whose purpose is to replace our AVO bridges is N12,097,215,800.09, which is for 12 months and it will include 7.5 per cent VAT. This contract is not only for supplying but it’s also for installation and maintenance, including spare parts and is awarded to a company called Gulf of Africa International Limited.”
