05 January 2015, Akure – Not satisfied with the pump price regime of petrol, marketers in Akure, the Ondo State capital and its environs yesterday closed their shops against motorists.
When THISDAY went round the town, all the marketers both independent and major, complained that they could not sell at N86 per litre, which the federal government recommended.
Despite the closure of stations, long queue of vehicles were at filling stations, particularly at major marketers stations with the hope that they could start selling any moment.
However, many of these filling stations sold products during the holiday due to the fact that there was nobody to enforce the new price.
A manager of one of the protesting filling stations who craved anonymity said they decided to close down operation because the federal government wanted to compel them to be selling at an N86.50 per litre, which according to him, did not meet the landing cost.
He said: “The owner of the station asked me to close our station because we learnt that the government want to force us to be selling at N86.50 per litre and we did not even buy the petrol at N86.50 at the depot, so how can we be selling at the official price?”
In his reaction to the development, the Chairman of the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria, Ore depot, Mr. Bayo Olowokere, said many marketers did not open for operation because they had no product to sell at the price recommended by the federal government.
Olowokere, who said the 50kobo reduction of the price was ridiculous, said the federal government cannot force the independent marketers to sell at the new official price because they did not buy the product at the regulated price.
“As I am speaking to you, in Ore, no marketers has bought the product at the regulated price, though the reduction is ridiculous, but the question is that are we getting the product at the regulated price? That is what we are fighting for.”
He said most of the independent marketers were buying at different private depots across the country as a result of the insufficient supply of the product from the NNPC depots.
- This Day