15 May 2015, Lagos – About six vessels laden with petroleum products, especially premium motor spirit (PMS) popularly called fuel are expected at the Lagos port soon.
The arrival of the tankers in the nation’s seaports, particularly the ones situated in Nigeria’s commercial nerve centre, Lagos is coming on the heels of worsening fuel scarcity across the country.
This has created untold hardship for the citizenry as the product is being sold far above the official price by black marketers across the country.
However, THISDAY checks revealed that the scarcity has turned out to be brisk business for owners of filling stations. Instead of dispensing the products from all the pumps, they sell from only one or two in the day time and sell to black marketers in the night, who in turn sell at very exorbitant prices to consumers.
This is a clear negation of the assurance of the federal government and the oil marketers that the scarcity would ease in the last weekend.
Data prepared by NPA and obtained by THISDAY stated that only six vessels laden with petroleum products, especially PMS, are in Nigeria’s territorial waters just as some of them have berth to discharge their cargoes.
The data,which was contained in the daily publication of the authority called Shipping Position, showed that only six tankers are expected at the port.
On the expected date of arrival (EDA), three vessels were listed under ‘awaiting berth’, category. This means that the vessels were yet to be allocated a place to berth in preparation for the discharge of the content.
Those affected include Sea Horizon with 35,000 metric tons (MT) of PMS (awaiting berth since April 2, 2015); Port Steward with 30,000mt of PMS (awaiting berth since April 6, 205) and Lux Lucis with 33,l000 MT of fuel (awaiting berth since April 20, 2015).
According to the data, three other vessels expected with PMS for the period under review include Eagle Tiger with 15,000 MT; Torm Vita with 27,467 MT; Sea Strealing and Tadema with 28,000 MT. They were billed to be in the port this weekend. One other tanker is expected with 5000 MT of diesel on May 25, 2015.
– This Day