We had all thought that the monster called fuel scarcity had been defeated in Nigerian, until events of the last two to three weeks proved otherwise.
Now, it’s fast becoming an impossibility to have stable supply of petroleum products in Nigeria. The story is the same all over the country. There have been as many probes, as many committees and as many reports as there are many importers and actors in the Nigerian oil and gas sector.
We had all thought that the monster called fuel scarcity had been defeated in Nigerian, until events of the last two to three weeks proved otherwise.
Now, it’s fast becoming an impossibility to have stable supply of petroleum products in Nigeria. The story is the same all over the country. There have been as many probes, as many committees and as many reports as there are many importers and actors in the Nigerian oil and gas sector.
Government has failed severally in its promise to make fuel available at all filling stations, irrespective of geo-political location.
At a point, it canvassed full deregulation of the downstream sector and this entails removal of subsidy on petroleum products.
For the obvious reason of epileptic power supply which will entail spending more money by families, businesses and homes to fuel vehicles, generators to provide alternative power supply, Nigerians, had earlier in 2012 fought for one week to oppose removal of subsidy on petrol.
Neither government nor the people won, because, the pump price was not returned to its pre-January 1, 2012 figure of N65/litre.
Even though, government did not have its way, it got N32 subsidy removed and for this, we have had debates, talks and probes, and now scarcity all over the country.
At a point in this country and in response to the perennial problem of scarcity, government set up a presidential committee which was headed by Bauchi state governor; Malam Isa Yuguda to come up with a workable solution to the problem. It is on record that it is the committee that recommended full deregulation.
It will be recalled that the PPPRA at that time said that it costs N85 to import a litre of petrol while the official pump price is N65. But the Yuguda committee says that the template price is unrealistic. It has therefore proposed that the price should be N77 per litre of petrol.
If deregulation had come on stream at that time, it would have cost a lot more than N77 to buy a litre of petrol.
Now we have gone beyond N77 and all the arguments about PPPRA templates, at the moment, everyone is looking for solution to the problem that has now turned Nigeria to a laughing stock among committee of oil producing nations.
Nigeria is the only nation in OPEC where its crude oil is exploited, shipped outside and imported back into its country of origin at an uncontrollable price. It is also the country that has the highest pump price of petrol among OPEC member states; also the country with the lowest per capita income, highest cost of living, highest infant mortality rate and lowest life expectancy rate.
The above does not imply in any way, that without crude oil, Nigerians would have been living a better life.
The fact is that it is obvious that this government does not have the solution to the problems that are bedeviling the supply and demand of petroleum products in Nigeria.
It is toying with the idea of deregulation; it is also battling with the passage of the all-important Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB).
Solving the nation’s oil and gas challenges and associated problems only requires a deep knowledge of the contending issues, as well as honesty and sincerity of purpose on the part of the executive and the legislature to pass the PIB
As for the persistent fuel scarcity, the solution still lies on the hands of the government to take charge of happenings in the downstream sector. There have been accusations and counter-accusations among the various players in the sector, but all these will stop once the PIB is passed into law.
The President needs to be more determined to see the PIB through; he needs to be firmer in taking decisions about the oil industry, he needs to clean the sector once and for the sake of the future of this nation.
It remains a national shame that the country, being the world’s sixth largest producer of hydrocarbon still imports refined petroleum products. We are of a very strong opinion that the passage of PIB will offer a lasting solution to the myriad of problems that are plaguing the oil and gas sector. The most obvious of these problems is the perennial shortage of petrol as it reoccurred in the last few weeks all over the country.
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