OpeOluwani Akintayo
Lagos — The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation has said the Federal Government will pay a subsidy of N57.82 on every litre of petrol consumed in Nigeria for the month of March.
This was revealed by NNPC’s Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Kennie Obateru during an interview with a Nigerian daily.
According to him, since NNPC is the sole importer of petrol, it would maintain an ex-depot price of N148.6/litre for the month pending when government would conclude its consultations and deliberations with labour unions.
“The government does not just look at economics to determine certain things. So the fact is that the government is not supposed to inflict pains on the citizenry.
“And this is why the government wants to do a very wide consultation with all interested parties so that an agreement could be reached and we expect that the agreement will be reached before too long.”
Nigeria consumes about 57.44 million litres of petrol daily, while the actual ex-depot cost for the product was N206.42/litre. But NNPC sells the commodity at an ex-depot price of N148.6/litre. This leaves a differential of N57.82 subsidy on every litre.
When asked to state how long NNPC would sustain subsidy on petrol, Obateru said this was dependent on government’s meeting with labour unions.
Obateru further insisted that NNPC would not hike petrol price in March so as not to fracture the ongoing discussions between government and the organised labour on the fuel price matter.
Controversy had ensued after the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency, PPPRA on Thursday published the expected new lower and upper prices for petrol at retail outlets in March 2021, putting the rates at between N209.61/litre and N212.61/litre.
It also put the ex-depot price of petrol for the month at N206.42/litre and pegged the expected landing cost at N189.61/litre.
It however pulled down the price band template following public outcry with an explanation that the earlier published template did not translate into a hike in pump price despite reflecting market realities.
