Following the official kick-off of the second phase of the electronic tracking of the loading and movement of fuel tankers from loading point at the depot to the discharging point by the management by the Petroleum Equalization Fund (PEF) in Lagos last week, stakeholders in the downstream of the petroleum sector have expressed doubts, saying that the scheme is not fool proof.
Following the official kick-off of the second phase of the electronic tracking of the loading and movement of fuel tankers from loading point at the depot to the discharging point by the management by the Petroleum Equalization Fund (PEF) in Lagos last week, stakeholders in the downstream of the petroleum sector have expressed doubts, saying that the scheme is not fool proof.
According to them, the project which is code- named “project aquila” may not really bring about any change in the abnormalities surrounding the collection of bridging claims on transported products.
Some concerned marketers who spoke with Shipping Position Daily in Lagos last week pointed out that even though the new scheme which was introduced by PEF in July last year is intended to effectively monitor the transportation of petroleum products in the country and to check illegitimate transactions, the project may not succeed or guarantee that the payment of claims gets into the right hands.
A petroleum marketer, Mr. Olisa Nlemibe stressed that, monitoring the petroleum tankers is not the only problem, but who gets the money for the bridging of the product. He was skeptical that the PEF electronic system will be able to erase the criminalities that have surrounded the collection of the actual claims over the years, according to him; the scheme did not give any assurance on eliminating the collection aspect.
Also reacting to the development, a marketer, Mr. Olanife Adeoye adviced that the PEF management board needs to focus more on the area and movement of the bill of laden on the products because according to him, if this is not well monitored, the old order will still remain.
“We usually have people coming from the North over to the depots in Lagos to buy these bill of laden from marketers with large sums of money, they take it back to collect the claims even before the product arrives at the destination, the PEF has not really stated how it intends to curb this practice”, he stated.
According to him, monitoring the trucks is very good in order to stop product diversion, but he pointed out that “monitoring alone is not the problem, but who are the people collecting the claims”.
Stressing that the scheme is not fool proof, he wondered that “what if the truck is stopped on the way at a check point and under this guise the product is discharged, or what if a big tarpaulin is used to cover the truck in order to make it invisible to the satellite that is monitoring it” he wondered.
Shipping Position Daily investigations at the depots in Lagos confirmed that the scheme has already started and that it is limited to only depots who are receiving products from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
According to a statement released by one of the NNPC depot, Rahamaniyya Oil and Gas Limited to all its marketers and sighted by our correspondent, the benefits includes; prompt payment of bridging claims, improved cash flow as well as fleet efficiency.
“To be eligible, you must register with PEF which takes some few minutes, your truck must be tagged, the exercise is compulsory for all marketers and failure may result to delay or nonpayment of bridging re-imbursement in the near future” the statement reads
Meanwhile, while addressing journalists in Lagos last week at the commencement of the Project Aquila phase 2, the Executive Secretary, Petroleum Equalization Fund, Mrs. Adefunke Kasali, had said that about 9,000 petroleum tankers, which represents between 40 to 55 per cent of tankers in the country had been tagged.
The PEF boss noted, “Aquila removes inefficiencies in the system. We ensure that the truck that loads arrive at its destination; that products are not discharged on the way; and that government gets its due in terms of revenue.”
She said all issues on the new technology had already been sorted out before the move to phase out the manual system, adding that both systems were currently running simultaneously pending when the management of the fund would be convinced that the Aquila Project could stand on its own.
According to her, ‘Aquila’ could only be applied to trucks that were tagged on the project. “Wherever we are present, our policy is ‘No tag, no loading’,” she stressed.
With the new system on ground, she said within two weeks of product delivery, payments for transactions could be achieved.
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