Presidency Unveils Plan To End Fuel Scarcity

ABUJA - A plan endorsed by President Muhammadu Buhari to conclusively end the recent fuel scarcity around the country is in progress and is expected to ensure that no such scarcity repeats itself again in the country.

A presidency official who disclosed this over the weekend added that in a matter of days virtually every state in the country would have returned to a very low queue situation in the filling stations or a completely restored situation with no long queues anymore.

The plan which was presented to Federal Executive Council (FEC ) last week, had been signed off previously by President Buhari before he left the country last week Sunday with clear goals that included a conclusive determination on the initial cause of the scarcity with attendant consequences imposed.

According to the source, “The plan is designed to do everything necessary to end the scarcity quickly and hold those responsible for it in the first instance responsible so as to avoid a repeat.”

Indeed, under the Buhari administration what used to be an incessant and recurring decimal of fuel scarcity had been reduced to barest minimum until the recent case of adulterated PMS, an incident that incurred the president’s wrath.

But the plan drawn up by the NNPC executives had won the endorsement of the president and the praise of the VP especially because of the 24-hour round the clock operations, including 24-hour sales in major supply centers in the country and the 24-hour continuous loading at all depots coordinated personally by the group managing director Mr Mele Kyari himself with the active participation of the director-general of the DSS, Alhaji Yusuf Bichi.

The 24-hour operations also has an enforcement element with monitoring teams “to prevent any act of sabotage and ensure smooth operations.”

That 24-hour operation also included the direct participation and support of members of the Major Oil Marketers Association of Nigeria, MOMAN, Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria, IPMAN and private depot owners.

By the end of last week, the country had over one billion litres total PMS stock, equivalent to about a month sufficiency based on the 60 million litres per day evacuation of the PMS. Lagos and Warri/Oghara loading zones hold the highest land stock of PMS with over 200m litres and over 100m litres respectively. The balance of the stock are held as marine stock.

The endorsed plan also maintains the high evacuation rate: which is the total amount of stock supplied until such a time that the distribution situation is normalised.

By the middle of last week, a National Filling Stations Queue Map presented to the Presidency and at FEC indicated that fuel supply had returned to normal in four states of Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom, Cross River and the FCT.

In another six states there were very small queues with mostly about ten cars at a time. Those states are Oyo, Osun, Lagos, Imo, Abia and Ebonyi.

It also indicated that in 13 states there were medium queues of maximum 50 cars. Those states are Delta, Rivers, Anambra, Edo, Ekiti, Kogi, Nasarawa, Bauchi, Kano, Ogun, Ondo, Sokoto and Zamfara.

In the rest of the 14 States, there were still high queues of above 50 cars at a time in the filling stations as at middle of last week.

According to the source, the most important thing to this presidency is that “this scarcity is quickly ended and a recurrence firmly avoided in the future. This now seems certainly possible.”