Malam Mele Kyari, NNPCL CEO.
Cmrd. Joe Ajaero, NLC President.
The Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited at the start of this week increased the price of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), also known as petrol, across its retail outlets. This is as the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) said it felt betrayed by the Federal Government over the “clandestine increases” in the price of petrol.
The price of the product, it was observed on Tuesday, was increased to N855 per litre, from about N600 at an NNPC filling station in the Berger axis of Lagos.
Another outlet operated by the oil firm around Awolowo road in Ikoyi, Lagos, also dispensed at N855 as seen here.
The upward adjustment comes amid a petrol scarcity which has strained business activities nationwide.
In a statement on September 1, national oil firm linked the shortages to its inability to sustain petrol supply due to a $6 billion debt it owes suppliers.
TheCable also observed that the price of AA Rano filling station in Karshi, Abuja, was increased to N900 per per litre.
The Mobil filling station on College Road, Ogba, Lagos also raised its price N868.
Media reports on Tuesday attributed the price adjustment to a directive of the federal government asking the NNPC to sell at N1,000.
Heineken Lokpobiri, minister for petroleum resources (oil), said the ministry never gave the national oil company such a directive.
Lokpobiri, in a statement signed by Nnemaka Okafor, his media aide, said reports of price directive were “ill-conceived to sow discord and confusion in the oil industry”.
“The Federal Government is compelled to address the outright falsehoods currently being circulated on social media, which claim that the Minister of Petroleum Resources (Oil), Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, has directed the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited to inflate petroleum prices above the approved pump price,” the statement reads.
“We categorically condemn these claims as baseless, malicious, and a deliberate attempt to incite public discontent. We challenge anyone in possession of any evidence-be it written documents, audio, or video recordings-that supports these fabrications to make it public.
“Such a claim is entirely devoid of truth and should be recognised as an intentional effort to mislead the public. It must be stressed that NNPCL operates as an independent entity under the Companies and Allied Matters Act, with a fully empowered Board of Directors.”
Lokpobiri said the ministry does not, and will not, interfere in the internal decisions of NNPC, including pricing matters.
The minister said the reports suggesting different perspective are incorrect and also reveal a profound misunderstanding of the deregulated nature of Nigeria’s petroleum sector.
On August 26, Lokpobiri had said petrol smuggling persists in Nigeria because the NNPC sell below the landing cost.
Prior to this, Umar Ajiya, the chief financial officer (CFO) of the NNPC, on August 20, said the company was selling petrol at only half the land cost.
Before the latest adjustment, the official pump price of petrol was about N600/litre but the landing cost is around N1,200.
However, in a statement, Joe Ajaero, the NLC president, said organised labour accepted N70,000 as minimum wage in July due to the government’s promise not to increase the petrol price.
Read the NLC statement: “We are filled with a deep sense of betrayal as the Federal Government clandestinely increases the pump price of PMS.
“One of the reasons for accepting N70,000 as the national minimum wage was the understanding that the pump price of PMS would not be increased even as we knew that N70,000 was not sufficient.
“We recall vividly when Mr. President gave us the devil’s alternatives to choose from: either N250,000 as minimum wage (subject to the rise of the pump price between N1,500 and N2,000) or N70,000 (at old PMS rates); we opted for the latter because we could not bring ourselves to accept further punishment on Nigerians.
“But here we are, barely one month after and with the government yet to commence payment of the new national minimum wage, confronted by a reality we cannot explain”.
Ajaero said the government should reverse the pump price of petrol across the country and retract the 250 percent tariff hike in electricity.
He said the labour congress would meet to make appropriate decisions in reaction to the stance of the Federal Government.
Said Ajaero: “On our part, we stand resolute with the people and will neither be distracted nor intimidated by the government or its security agencies.
“We insist that the government cannot criminalise protests or basic rights in the domain of the citizenry.
“Accordingly, we demand the immediate reversal of the latest increase in the pump of PMS across the country, the release of all those incarcerated or being prosecuted on the assumption of having participated in the recent protests; halt the indiscriminate arrest and detention of citizens on trumped-up charges; reversal of the 250% tariff hike in electricity; stop to the hijack of the duties of the ministry of labour and employment; end to policies that engender hunger and insecurity; and halt to government’s culture of terror, fear, and lying”.
