Chima Ugwuanyi
30 November 2012, Sweetcrude, Enugu – Network for Good Governance, NGG, a non-profit organisation, has commended the Pipelines and Products Marketing Company, PPMC, for alleviating the sufferings of people in the Aba metropolis by pumping automotive gas and oil, also known as diesel, to its Aba depot.
The group said the development would reduce the impact of excruciating scarcity of the product in the area, as well as the incessant breakdown of equipment due to product adulteration.
Speaking at a press conference in Aba, Abia State, on Wednesday, the Coordinator of the group, Mazi. Tony Udenta, commended the efforts of PPMC in ensuring that petroleum products are made available across the country, especially in Aba where its depot was recently re-opened for loading.
“We want to use this opportunity to express the gratitude of all the residents of Aba and its environs, for the recent opening of Aba depot of the PPMC and the subsequent pumping of petroleum products into the depot, more especially diesel which earlier than now, has remained elusive to our people,” he said.
According to Udenta, many have fallen victims of adulterated products in the area, due to scarcity, occasioned by the closure of the depot because of pipeline vandalisation, adding that good governance entails providing essential amenities to the people by the government and petroleum products are very important to the business development in the area.
“Now that there is availability of products in the depot, the nefarious activities of those selling adulterated diesel to the public would be eliminated in no distant time. Most people in the area have lost their generators to bad diesel and it also affects the cost of production in the area because most the manufacturing companies here rely on generator for their power.
“But with the concerted efforts of PPMC in this regards, our people will heave a sigh of relief,” he pointf out.
Udenta said that the Aba depot was cut off from supply of petroleum products by the PPMC in 2006, due to the activities of vandals but was re-commissioned in July this year with the supply of fuel (premium motor spirit) only.
He noted: “The Aba depot is strategic because it serves as a link for product evacuation from Port Harcourt refinery through a 12-inch pipeline spanning 54 kilometres for transmission to Enugu, Makurdi and Yola. This makes it important in the distribution of petroleum products in the country and all the while it was shut down, our people suffered immensely which also affected economic activities in Aba. But with the reopening and eventual restoration of products lifting, life has returned”.
The depot, comprising 12 storage tanks was commissioned about 33 years ago, with a combined designed capacity to hold about 103 million litres of petroleum products- including PMS, DPK and AGO.
