Kunle Kalejaye
24 May 2016, Sweetcrude, Lagos — Major oil Marketers Association of Nigeria, MOMAN has allayed fear over the possible increase of Premium Motor Spirit, PMS price above N145 per litre.
The body assured Nigerians and the Civil Society groups that it will not take advantage of deregulation and sell above government approved band price.
Addressing journalists in Lagos on Tuesday MOMAN’s Executive Secretary Obafemi Olawore explained the reason why the pump price of PMS will not increase noting that major marketers will rely on their upstream divisions to get dollars to finance their imports.
According to him, “I’m assuring Nigerians that pump price of petrol will soon drop as against claims that it will rise above the present band. Price won’t go up as long as the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) is bringing in products.
“Although, we are expected to source for dollars at the parallel market but the good news is that we are getting dollars from our upstream divisions.
“Shell supports Conoil, Agip to support Oando, ExxonMobil supports Mobil Oil Nigeria, Total supports Total Nigeria, MRS and Forte get support from NNPC,” he said.
However, he stated that full deregulation is the answer to the fuel scarcity challenges in Nigeria.
“The solution to fuel scarcity is full deregulation. If there is no policy reversal, marketers will bring in products. The situation will encourage us to bring in more investment. We have invested in meters presently to ensure adequate metering.
“Others are doing their calculations in how to bring in investment in refineries and once we begin to refine domestically, it means we have attained full deregulation,” he said.
On allegations that marketers are making an abnormal profit because they are selling old stock, he debunked the claims by stating that “announcement of new price would have been made on Saturday, 7th May, but it was discovered that marketers had plenty stock and would have made an abnormal profit.
“So, the government waited for the majority of our members to sell most of their old stocks before announcing new pump price on Wednesday 11th May.
“We have not been making much profit like that, what we have been doing is to continue in business since our fixed costs are always being recovered,” he said.