Story Summary:
- Nigerian petroleum marketers are demanding transparency from Dangote Refinery regarding the price at which it sold petrol to the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL).
- NNPCL announced new petrol prices, with costs ranging from N950.22 per litre in Lagos to N1,019.22 in Borno State, though these prices have not yet been implemented.
- The ongoing dispute over petrol pricing has heightened concerns in the sector, with independent marketers potentially pushing pump prices to as high as N1,200 per litre.
Petroleum marketers in Nigeria are caught in uncertainty following the controversy over the pricing of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) by Dangote Refinery, as released by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) on Monday.
The marketers are calling for Dangote Refinery to disclose the price at which it sold petrol to NNPCL to ensure transparency. They emphasised that Nigeria cannot rely solely on domestic petrol production to meet its daily consumption needs, which currently stand at N50 million, according to the latest data from the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority.
Billy Gillis-Harry, President of the Petroleum Products Retail Outlets Owners Association (PETROAN), and Abubakar Maigandi, President of the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria, voiced these concerns in separate interviews with DAILY POST on Monday.
Earlier, NNPCL announced new retail prices for Dangote petrol across its outlets nationwide. The revised prices indicate that petrol will be sold at N950.22 per litre in Lagos, N960 per litre in Oyo and other South West states, and N999.22 per litre in the Federal Capital Territory (Abuja), Kano, and Kaduna. In Imo and Rivers states, petrol will cost N980.20 per litre, while Borno State will see a price of N1,019.22 per litre.
While DAILY POST has learned that these new prices have not yet been implemented, there are indications that fuel prices may soon rise nationwide.
Furthermore, DAILY POST has noted that NNPCL has yet to disclose the price at which it will sell Dangote Refinery petrol to marketers, who own most of the filling stations in Nigeria. Historically, petrol prices at independent marketers’ stations exceed those at NNPCL retail outlets by over N100, potentially pushing the price of fuel to around N1,200 per litre.
Dangote Refinery began its first petrol distribution over the weekend, with NNPCL as the official offtaker. NNPCL had previously revealed that Dangote Refinery sold petrol to them at N898 per litre. However, Dangote Group has disputed this figure and has not disclosed the actual price of the inaugural petrol supply.
This discrepancy has sparked a petrol price controversy, exacerbating the ongoing crisis in the sector.
