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N49
/ litre fuel: DPR shuts 7 filling stations
•NLC
raises monitoring teams
SEGUN JAMES, Warri
and agency report
THE
hammer fell on seven filling stations of major marketers in Warri, Delta State
yesterday as the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) shut them down for
alleged non-compliance with the new petrol price of N49.00 per litre.
Affected marketers in Warri are
Oando (four stations), Texaco (two) and Total (one).
As the DPR shuts the stations,
Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has despatched letters to its councils in states
of non-compliance to raise monitoring committees.
The punitive measure came as
marketers in Abuja, Anambra and some states were yet to comply with the new
price regime even as filling stations in Lagos have largely reduced their rates
to between N49 and N49.80 per litre.
Also, Nigerian National Petroleum
Corporation (NNPC) has threatened to bar marketers who do not sell at N49.00 a
litre from lifting petroleum products at its depots nation-wide.
Speaking with newsmen on behalf of
the Operations Controller, DPR office in Warri, Mrs. Rose Ogra, Public Affairs
Officer, Mr. Paul Ekele, said no independent marketer’s station was closed
because as at the time the price regime took effect, they were on strike.
Ekele insisted that his men are
going round to ensure that the new price is complied with while also ensuring
that there is no under-dispensing by smart marketers.
Ekele lamented that the DPR had
closed 39 stations in the past for fraudulently adjusting their pumps.
He regretted that the Edo/ Delta
axis of the down stream sector of the oil industry is particularly notorious for
such nefarious acts.
Ekele said what the DPR officials
now do is move about with the standard measuring can to ensure that the metres
are not adjusted fraudulently, adding that in this way, they would know that
marketers have complied with the directive on the new price.
But, the NLC, whose one week grace
to the Federal Government to enforce implementation of the new price regime
expired Sunday, is said to have written several state councils to set up
monitoring teams to effect compliance.
Competent Labour sources told Daily
Champion that when the teams commence work, several filling stations
nation-wide may be shut.
"The situation may lead to
crisis as we envisage resistance," the source said.
Meanwhile, investigations in Abuja
have revealed that most of the filling stations still sell petrol at N53.00 per
litre.
Only the NNPC mega station in the
city sold at N49.00, while most of the major and independent marketers sold at
N53 per litre.
At AP station, Maitama, its manager
said it was formerly selling at N54.30 per litre before the new directive which
prompted its management to adjust the price to N53 per litre.
Some of the filling stations visited
claimed that they were still selling old stock bought at the old high price and
could not revert to the new price.
"Until we exhaust the old stock
we cannot afford to sell at the new price," one of the independent
marketers at Wuse district who asked for anonymity, said.
It was observed that some marketers
even shut down their operations to create artificial scarcity.
A female attendant at one of the
Oando filling stations, said the station had also reduced the pump price to
N53.00 litre from N54.00 per litre.
"Our ogas came here in
the morning and changed the price to N53 and they instructed us to sell like
that," she said.
"All our filling stations in
the metropolis are selling at N53 because nobody gave them any directive or
order with regard to the new fuel price," she added.
Petroleum products marketers in Awka,
the Anambra State capital, have not reflected the new approved pump prices of
products one week after government’s announcement.
A survey showed that Texaco, Conoil,
Okeb and Olyum fuel stations at Amawbia sold petrol for between N54.00 and
N56.00 while kerosene sold for N63.00 per litre.
Some of the station attendants
claimed that they had not exhausted their old stock which they bought at the old
rates.
Others said they had not received
directives from their management to sell at the new rate of N49.00 for petrol.
In a related development, some
petrol stations said they suffered financial losses during the recent three-day
destruction of property by hoodlums in the state.
Narrating their experiences, station
attendants, who preferred anonymity, said that during the crisis, the hoodlums
purchased fuel in more than 200 vehicles worth between N15,000 and N20,000 at
their stations without payment.
According to the victims, the
hoodlums threatened to burn down their stations if they failed to comply.
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