Fuel scarcity: Marketers, FG finally agree on price

Oil marketers have agreed with the Federal Government to keep the pump price of petrol at N145 per litre.
The marketers softpedaled on Wednesday, reversing their previous stance on the pricing of the product.

The Chairman of the Depot and Petroleum Products Marketers Association, Dapo Abiodun, had on Tuesday, stated that the marketers could no longer import petrol at a controlled price of N145 per litre.
But Punch reports that yesterday, the marketers reversed their stance at the meeting of the ad hoc committee set up by the Presidency to get the oil marketers to restart the importation of refined petroleum products.
The newspaper said that a communique on the resolutions reached at the meeting would be made public soon.
It reports also that the marketers appealed to the Federal Government to grant them tax holidays and other incentives that would help cut their costs when they resume fuel importation.

According to the report, four sub-committees were constituted at the meeting, which was chaired by the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu, at the ministry’s headquarters in Abuja.
A top source at the meeting told Punch that the committees included those on logistics and business conduct, adding that the agreements reached at the meeting would be relayed to the Presidency before the communique would be made public.
Heads of some parastatals under the Federal Ministry of Petroleum Resources were members of some of the committees, according to the report.