Oscarline Onwuemenyi
31 March 2016, Sweetcrude, Abuja – In its bid to put an end to the ongoing fuel crisis across the country, the Federal government has entered into an agreement with independent petroleum marketers to provide major intervention especially in the rural areas.
The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu and members of the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) on Wednesday reached an agreement that will see IPMAN play a major role in the distribution of petrol to the hinterlands and state capitals in Nigeria.
The General Secretary of IPMAN, Mr. Danladi Pasali, told journalists in Abuja that the association met with the Minister where an agreement to have IPMAN members become major players in measures initiated by Kachikwu to push more petrol into service stations across the country and clear out the lingering scarcity.
According to him, the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation’s boss has accepted to grant fuel import allocation licenses to IPMAN members with the capacity to import petrol, improved petrol supplies to IPMAN operated filling stations, as well as the provision of credit facilities to reliable members of the association.
“We are happy to tell you that yesterday we had a meeting with the minister. IPMAN reconciliation committee that came together, both the interim of IPMAN that has now come together as one body,” said Pasali.
He further said, “What we agreed is that he has now seen the importance of working with IPMAN and he has now agreed to give massive products to IPMAN’s members nationwide and he has also agreed to issue out importation license to IPMAN members which had been the practice in the past.”
The spokesperson of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, Mr. Garuba Deen Mohammed confirmed the meeting held. He also confirmed some of the agreements that were reached at the meeting including Kachikwu’s mediation and settlement of the lingering differences in the association.
Pasali claimed that IPMAN has the largest distribution facility in the country and as such was in a better position to work with Kachikwu to end the petrol scarcity which has continued to bite hard in city centers and fringes of the federal capital city Abuja.
He added that “You know that IPMAN controls 80 per cent of the downstream. We have also agreed to monitor our members to ensure that these products go to the nooks and crannies of this country where they are needed most.”