The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of
Nigeria (PENGASSAN) says the pump price of premium motor spirit (PMS), also
called petrol, should be between N360 and N400 a litre, after the removal of
subsidy.
Festus Osifo, president of PENGASSAN, made this known while speaking
to journalists on the sidelines of the association’s national executive council
(NEC) meeting, in Abuja on Tuesday.
The federal government has projected to spend N3.35 trillion
on petrol subsidy (which may be removed by June) this year.
Speaking on the matter, Osifo said the price of the product,
after subsidy is scrapped, will be determined by the official foreign exchange
rate, sourced by Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited for petrol
importation.
“Today, the sole importer
of PMS into Nigeria is the NNPC. The NNPC is using an exchange rate of the CBN
which gives about N400 to N450 depending on the day and depending on the window
that you are looking at. So, if you compute that into the model today, PMS
should be selling for a region of about N360 to N400 [a litre],” Osifo said.
The PENGASSAN president said the association has compelled
all of its organs across the country to make petrol available to Nigerians and
has threatened to revoke the licences of any member found to be hoarding
petrol.
Osifo added that functional local refineries will not only
lower the price of petrol but also create jobs for Nigerians.
“While maintaining
our support for the full deregulation of the sector and the significant milestone
achieved in this regard, we counsel that efforts be made to increase the pace
of the current rehabilitation exercise of refineries and get them back on track
in due time,” he said.
Osifo said the incoming administration must address the
currency swap as well as sporadic fuel scarcity across the country, while
palliatives must be made available to Nigerians to mitigate the impact of the
petrol subsidy removal.
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
Then tinubu should pay subsidy for one more year and make sure all refineries are back to full operations
ReplyDelete