Yemisi Izuora/Ijeoma Agudosi/Hyacinth Chinwuba
The volatile fuel situation in Lagos state worsened at the weekend as many dispensing outlets ran out of stock.
Marketers have maintained that they don’t have enough product to distribute.
Panic buying has not abated despite assurances from the new minister of state for petroleum resources, Ibe Kachikwu who has continuously claimed the country is wet with product.
At the weekend most filling stations virtually ran out of stock creating serious traffic bottleneck as insignificant number of outlets with products have to attend to several hundreds of vehicles on the queue.
Oriental News Nigeria went round some parts of the state and witnessed long queues at few filling stations that had product.
Mostly hit are Ikorodu, Iyana Ipaja, Igando and Epe areas which are in the outskirt of the state.
Most depots at Apapa and Satelite depot operated by Depot and Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (DAPPMA) have no petrol.
Biodun Lawal corporate affairs manager of NIPCo confirmed the company has supply from NNPC but the stock is limited.
Some other marketers could neither confirm nor deny the true situation of things.
Kachikwu last week said there was enough supply of petrol, claiming that the country currently has enough of the product to last for about 22 or 23 days.
“The absence of product is not the issue. What is the issue is the usual panic-buying by Nigerians.
The number of trucks that have been moved around over the last three days are in excess of 4,000, whereas the total normal utilisation yield is about 2,500 trucks.
Again, there are people who store products and the DPR has sealed a lot of such stations in the last one week,” he added.
But Alamu Ayo, chairman, Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) Ejigbo satelite depot who spoke in Lagos said there is no enough fuel at the moment to sustain supply.
He insisted that private depots both at Apapa and satelite area of Ejigbo which feed most of the western states are dry.
“I can tell you that there is no fuel, the little that NNPC has is not enough to go round and we are all rationing.
What I can say is that the NNPC has product that could last for four days and that is about last week.
As of today (Monday) we are loading one truck and the quantity available can last for just two days, so what I am saying is that by tomorrow we will deplete the available stock” the chairman said.