The Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority NMDPRA has disclosed that the Federal government has imported 300 million liters of petrol into the country to close the gap created by the contaminated petrol withdrawn from depots and filling stations.
The Chief Executive Officer of the agency, Farouk Ahmed, said at least six vessels of petroleum products have been ordered by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC). Ahmed said the agency has been able to work with the technical team that included the Major Oil Marketers Association of Nigeria, the NNPC and the Depot and Petroleum Products Marketers Association of Nigeria to address the issue.
“We have vessels that have arrived in the country recently. At least six arrived in the last few days ordered by the NNPC, carrying a total volume of close to 300 million litres, just to close the gap created by those vessels we have withdrawn from the system.”he said
“Our ideal days of sufficiency are 30 but because of the concern that made us withdraw the vessels; this created the gap in our 30 days sufficiency. Again, with aggressive importation by the NNPC, this will be closed in a few days, according to the data we got from the NNPC’s import programme.
“Loading is also ongoing in most of the depots that have confirmed spec products; so, there is no need for panic. Hopefully, by tomorrow, Lagos will be cleared.
“So, once these vessels complete discharging and start pushing the products to marketers, I believe Lagos will be cleared by Friday. We have got that assurance from the marketers.
“Also, most of these vessels will also be providing volumes to most of the members of the key members of DAPPMAN” Ahmed said”