The Federal Government yesterday expressed concern over the lingering fuel scarcity in some parts of the country and assured that oil marketers would on Thursday(today) receive the sum of N156 billion as payment for fuel subsidy.
The Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, made the disclosure while speaking with journalists shortly after declaring open the 20th conference of Directors General of Customs of the World Customs Organisation.
The minister while sympathising with Nigerians over the biting fuel scarcity, said the government is working hard to end the situation within the shortest possible time possible.
She said despite the revenue challenges facing the government, the issue of fuel subsidy payments to oil marketers had always been prioritized by the Federal Government.
According to the minister, the government had in December 2014 paid the sum of N350bn to oil marketers, noting that an additional N31bn in foreign exchange differentials had already been released.
“On the issue of oil marketers, we have really been working with them and we have been dialoguing with them all along. We’ve paid N350bn in December, we paid them N31bn in foreign exchange differentials and by tomorrow (Thursday) we will be paying them N100bn for which we had earlier given them IOUs for as well as their interest rate differentials of N56bn.
“So, I am about to go and sign, to get that paid and I think that Nigerians can see that the government is making maximum effort to accommodate the oil marketers. They are also Nigerians, and they need to also cooperate with us.”
Meanwhile, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) announced it has enough stock of petrol to service the country for 27 days at a national consumption rate of 40 million litres per day even as it has stepped up efforts to end the distribution challenges in the fuel supply system.
The Corporation in a statement said it has sufficient stock of petrol at its coastal depots in Port Harcourt, Warri, and Calabar besides the stock it holds in the national strategic reserves.
“We are, however, working towards a speedy resolution of the issues to ensure a hitch-free distribution of products across the country”, NNPC stated.
Abubakar Suleiman, National Planning Minister had told State House correspondents yesterday that fuel scarcity problem is not that government do not have fuel on ground.” We have a problem with the tanker drivers and it bothers on non-payment.”
“But from Thursday, the coordinating minister of the economy is going to start payment of some of the liabilities we have in that sector and it will ease off. But we do have enough fuel on ground to last us for 27 days. That I can assure you even if we are consuming 4 million liters per day. But the problem we have is logistics and the problems with the unions and non-payment. So, you don’t have to wait for Buhari Administration to fix it, we can fix it and we have been fixing it,” he assured.