OpeOluwani Akintayo
Lagos — The Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR has clarified that its Director, Sarki Auwalu was quoted out of context following recent reports attributed to him that petrol could be sold for as high as N1000 per litre if subsidy was removed without alternative.
A statement by the Department faulted the reports, describing it as a “misinterpretation”.
“DPR wishes to state that the headline of the publication is misleading as the comments of the Director/CEO DPR was clearly taken out of context.
“The Director/CEO specifically created a scenario of price instability of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) based on current dollar to naira differentials to the effect that if Nigeria continues to rely on the importation of PMS without creating alternative energy sources like CNG, LNG, AUTOGAS etc which will provide price buffers for consumers and ultimately crash the price of pms, then the product will be subject to prevailing market forces.
“The Director further reemphasized that the strategy for alternative energy sources is a cardinal program of the government which has led to the declaration of the Decade of Gas (DoG) with the objective to migrate the Nigerian economy to a gas based economy by 2030.
“The Department hereby restates that we will continue to enable businesses and create opportunities through our downstream focus on Quality, Quantity, Integrity and safety (QQIS)”, the statement said.
