The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria,
IPMAN, has threatened to shut down its filling stations nationwide over pressure from the federal government to implement price controls.
The spokesperson of IPMAN, Chinedu Ukadike, made this known
in a recent interview.
Recall that the minister of petroleum resources (oil),
Heineken Olokpobiri, had called on the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream
Petroleum Regulatory Authority to clamp down on petroleum product marketers
exploiting fuel consumers.
Earlier, the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection
Commission had ordered and also expressed similar concerns on Sunday in a
statement, warning fuel marketers against exploitative petrol prices.
The position by Nigerian government authorities comes as
Brent and West Texas Intermediate fall to $72 and 69 per barrel, up from over
$100 per barrel due to Iran, United States-Israel conflict easing.
However, fuel prices in Nigeria remain high despite the
recent petrol price reduction by the Dangote refinery and filling station.
In Abuja, for instance, fuel is currently sold between N1210
and N1300 per liter in most filling stations.
But the recent drop in fuel price is not commensurate with
the level of crude oil price decline.
This is why Nigerian government authorities had warned
marketers against exploitative fuel pricing.
Reacting to this, Ukadike threatened that petroleum product
marketers would shut down their retail outlets if the federal government tried
to enforce price control despite the sector being deregulated in line with the
Petroleum Industry Act.
He lamented that in the past weeks, marketers have lost
between N10 and N15 billion due to fuel price reductions.
“Capital is hard to gather. There is no buffer area for
marketers. Most of us are losing N10 to N15 billion due to the recent fuel
price reduction. You buy at a particular price before you get to your station;
the price had further reduced. We sell at a loss to be competitive. If you
don’t sell at a competitive price, nobody will buy.
“Marketers will shut down if they try somehow to enforce
price control. We are going to shut down our stations nationwide. You can’t be
regulating a deregulated market. You can’t tell me how much to sell my product
without trying to know how much I bought it.
“You can’t be blowing hot and cold at the same time. The
Petroleum Industry Act must be followed to the letter. If they try to enforce
price control, we will shut down,” Ukadike said.
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