ENUGU — THE only way out of the perennial scarcity of petroleum products and price hike is for President Olusegun Obasanjo to hands off his continued hold on the Ministry of Petroleum Resources and appoint a substantive Minister to oversee its affair, Enugu State Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Comrade Mike Ene, said yesterday. The NLC boss spoke in Enugu just as fuel dealers in the state capital, yesterday, complained about the supply of adulterated and foul-smelling fuel to filling stations by the NNPC Depot Emene, Enugu between Wednesday and yesterday.
The NPPC, Depot Manager, Mr. Kenneth Eke, however, confirmed the report saying some major dealers had reported the unfortunate discoveries to his office. Speaking with reporters on the current crisis in the petroleum sector, Comrade Ene lamented that since the control of the Petroleum Ministry was brought under the supervision of the President, the deluge of problems, which had trailed the distribution, and pricing of the petroleum products had worsened. He said that it would be unfair and a great disservice to Nigerians for the office of the President to continue to have its strong grips on petroleum affairs in the country.
Ene makes case for petrol resources minister
“We don’t see why a product like petrol in this country should not have a Minister. The President should hands off the Petroleum Ministry. It should not be a monopoly of Mr. President,” Ene said. Continuing, the NLC Chairman pointed out that another measure that could solve the problem in the sector, was to ensure that the nation’s refineries were made to function rather than regular importation of fuel, adding that “if the refineries are now scrap as we are informed by our leaders, why did the Federal Government not repair them so that fuel could be refined locally instead of spending so much money on fuel importation.”
He said that if Nigeria wants to move forward, the leadership must show that it has the interest of the citizens at heart. On the level of compliance with the order of an Abuja High Court on the price regime, Ene said that the NLC would not relent in ensuring that the order was effectively carried out in the state, declaring, “We are not joking about it.” Speaking specifically on the attitude of oil marketers in Enugu State, which he described as “exploitative and capitalist in nature”, Ene said that labour was worried that despite the closure last week of 14 filling stations in the state by Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), the affected stations have not only reopened but also selling petrol above the stipulated price of N38.
“The manager of Pipelines station at Abakpa Nike was almost going to engage labour in a physical combat because we were against the sale of petrol at N60. We are not happy about the sale of petrol at high prices.
The station was closed last Friday and today they have reopened and still selling at N60 per litre,” Ene said. He called on the government, law enforcement agents, and the masses in the state to assist labour in fighting against the exploitative tendencies of the oil marketers in the state.
“We have to discourage the buyers from buying from the marketers who sell at exorbitant prices. The masses should also assist us to resist the marketers who are cheating on the masses,” the labour leader pleaded.
Threatening that labour would mobilize the masses of Enugu State to rise against the marketers should the government and other concerned agencies fail to tackle the greed and selfishness of the marketers, Ene said: “We cannot sit back and watch marketers cheat the masses. If government fails, we will now call on the masses to match force with force against the marketers. We will mobilize the masses and it will now become the masses versus Enugu State oil marketers.” Continuing, the labour leader said:
“We are going to write a strongly worded letter to Enugu State Government to rise up to its responsibility. Where we have our problem is IPMAN. A situation where we have petrol being sold in Enugu at N60 is not acceptable to us. People adjust their meters with a view to cheating the masses in Enugu. Labour is not joking about it. We have said that we are going to match force with force.” Meanwhile, major petroleum marketers in Enugu have raised an alarm over the supply of adulterated fuel to them.
Their complaint followed protests by motorists who bought fuel on Wednesday that their vehicles developed faults after buying fuel from the affected stations. A dealer along the Zik Avenue told Vanguard that the motorists complained that the fuel bought from the station had foul smelling odour and gaseous smell, which had a damaging effects on their carburetors. “Our customers have been complaining of the contamination of fuel we sold to them yesterday (Wednesday). They said the fuel contained some gases, which damaged their carburetors.
We got our supply from the PPMC Depot at Emene and because of this bitter complaints from our customers, we have suspended sales for today (Thursday) until we get fresh supply from the PPMC,” the dealer who pleaded anonymity said. When contacted, the Depot Manager, Mr. Eke said some of the major marketers contacted his office after discovering the alleged bad fuel, but denied that the fuel came from the depot. “Some of the major marketers came here to complain about adulteration and contamination of fuel which they claimed they lifted from here on Wednesday. But I have told them to bring the sample of the fuel for testing so that we verify where the problem is coming from,” the Depot Manager said.
