TVCE [ABUJA] – Minister of State for Petroleum Resources Dr. Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu on Monday said the Federal Government was working out modalities for the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to establish more mega petrol stations.
Although the minister did not give the exact figure of mega stations to be established, he assured that there are many new filling stations the corporation is working on.
“Definitely, there are many fillings stations we were trying to develop working with the governors in terms of land, local government areas. The idea is to be able to expand our wings in crisis period. Some of that is going to come with Joint Ventures with some filling stations, which are willing to do JVs with us and so the 800 are not going to be built anew,” Kachikwu said.
He warned petrol marketers selling petrol above the official pump prices to revert to the Petroleum Product Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) prices.
The minister cautioned marketers, who were manipulating pump prices, saying: “I have asked DPR to oil up their enforcement machine because they are not doing it as much as I want it to happen. And we are going to have security agencies if any filling station is found to be selling products above the pump price. We are going to seal those stations. We are going to dispense the products for free. We will seal the stations and we are not going to reopen them until three months.”
Kachikwu, who is also the group managing director of the NNPC, admitted that the Federal Government had been lacking in the implementation of official petrol prices compliance in the hinterland, vowing that government would intensify the compulsory compliance with pump prices in rural areas.
He said government needed to do more since consumers in the rural areas, who are relatively poor are mostly affected by high pump price.
The minister assigned the Managing Director, Product Pipeline Marketing Company, Esther Nnamdi-Ogbue to look into how kerosene was allocated to ensure that it is available, especially in NNPC filling stations .
