Petroleum marketers have said that Nigerians will have to pay N800/litre for Premium of Motor Spirit, popularly called petrol, if subsidy is removed on the product.
This concern was raised by Mohammed Shuaibu, the Secretary of the Suleja chapter of the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN).
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According to him, “If the government fails to take the appropriate measures, and they say they want to remove fuel subsidy, the situation will be worse than this, the masses will suffer. How can you remove subsidy and you don’t have this product (petrol).”
The operators said the high cost of subsidy on petrol was a burden on the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited and was contributory to the prolonged crisis in the downstream oil sector.
The oil marketers said while it could be advisable to remove subsidy, Nigerians should know that the cost of petrol could cross N800/litre once the commodity was no longer subsidized.
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They urged the Federal Government to ensure that all the necessary measures and infrastructure to ensure a less stressful subsidy removal regime were put in place before implementing the decision.
He added, “If the government removes subsidy, where is the product? If you are removing subsidy, maybe by that time, the way diesel is sold at between N800 – N900/litre, we could be buying petrol at N800/litre, if not more than that.
“This is because the product will be scarce, even from the government cycle. So the government should tell Nigerians the truth about this fuel supply crisis. It is not a problem caused by marketers.”
Shuaibu said oil marketers were ready to sell, stressing that when marketers got products a few weeks ago, the queues disappeared.
The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, recently suggested that the government should gradually withdraw subsidy on PMS, stressing that the budgetary allocation for subsidy would end in June.