A pro-democracy and environmental rights advocacy group, the Foundation for Environmental Rights, Advocacy and Development, FENRAD, has lent its voice in condemnation of the current price regime of the petroleum industry, which is plaguing all Nigerians, especially the poor.
Today, fuel sells for N1000 and above in parts of the country, with transport fares increasing sporadically.
Nigerians are already groaning over the hardship which the fuel pump price hike had brought about, with many threatening protests in the near future.
According to the Executive Director of the Abia-based group, Comrade Nelson Nnanna Nwafor, the FENRAD, as a keen observer of the industry, regrets that the current regime is driven by people whose understanding of the issue begs the question, whether competence is still the yardstick of choosing who gets what and how.
Noting the confusion that pervades the entire petroleum industry, Nwafor regretted the many contradictory policy statements issued, which do not show consistency.
“First, the federal government removed subsidy on petrol causing hardships on all Nigerians, and when it became clear that the federal government is still subsidizing the NNPC through under-recovery, it still kept everything undisclosed, even after Dangote, a business mogul built his 650,000-barrel per day refinery, the biggest in Africa.
“The government and its agencies appeared to be working at cross purposes.
“First, the government, after Dangote complained that some challenges wouldn’t allow him to carry out his business, later set up a committee to work out the modalities of selling crude to Dangote in the naira.
“Up until now, that committee chaired by the Honourable Minister of Finance, Wale Edun, has yet to release a single line of report on how that goal can be achieved. Rather, the news went that the Federal Executive Council, FEC will determine the price of the product in an open market economy like ours. Later, Dangote said the NNPC would be the one to determine the price of its product. But today, the NNPC is saying that the price of the product (from Dangote) will be determined by market forces and foreign exchange. What then did the order to sell crude to Dnagote in the naira mean, if market forces and FX are to determine the price of Dangote’s product?” he queried.
The Foundation observed that Dangote’s investment is situated in a free trade zone where Nigerian tax and labour laws don’t apply, meaning that any purchase therein being moved to other parts of the country is considered as importation attracting charges like Form M and bill of lading, which the independent marketers cannot afford given that the landing cost differentials would be covered by them.
He noted that without government intervention, no private marketer can directly buy Dangote’s product.
He said; “The NNPC is owing $6 billion to her suppliers. Currently, oil prices plummeted below the budgetary benchmark of the federal government, initially at $77.96 per barrel, down to $70 meaning that a revenue shortfall had crept into the budget of 2024 already. Since the federal government is now unable to subsidize Dangote’s product, chances of the marketers buying from him are not there.”
Nwafor called on the federal government to allow local players to come to the mainstream local market as the pain cannot continue.
He also called on the Nigerian government to begin to move away from ‘petrolism’ to clean, renewable and smart agriculture.
“The world is not waiting for us, says the Foundation. Let us expand the oil industry landscape by having the content monitoring board license qualified local refiners, to help us escape the looming energy crisis in a country whose economic livewire is one thing – petrol.
“The oil sector is the federal government’s exclusive preserve, fixing it requires national planning. Let the promised hope begin to come.,” the FENRAD boss posited.
