Nigeria’s secret police, the Department of State Services (DSS) has given a 48-hour ultimatum to major stakeholders in downstream sector of the oil sector, especially the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited and oil marketers, to resolve the ongoing scarcity of premium motor spirit (known locally as petrol) or have the agency step in.
There has been an inexplicable fuel scarcity in the country with stakeholders in a blame game, amid suspicion of a ploy to force an increase in pump price of the product.
Dr. Peter Afunanya, DSS spokesperson, after a meeting of stakeholders at the headquarters of the service on Thursday, said the state secret service would commence operations nationwide if the petrol distribution crisis persists.
His words after the stakeholders’ meeting: “It is the mandate of the Service to detect and prevent threat to national security. This is why the Service has to summon the stakeholders meeting in the oil and gas sector to find a lasting solution to the problem before it snowballs into crisis
“There is an agreement that marketers will be operating for 24hrs on daily basis and that tankers owners said all hands will be on deck to ensure the lifting of the products.
“IPMAN has also committed itself to ensure that the product is available for 24 hours daily. The NNPC Ltd disclosed that it has over 1.9bn litres of PMS in stock and also agreed to sell the products at official ex-depot price to all oil marketers nationwide
“Therefore, we insisted that the fuel distribution must improve and all challenges eliminated in 48 hours and after 48hrs, we will as a matter of urgency carry out operations across the country.
“And in doing this, we won’t mind whose ox is gored. We are sounding a note of warning that it won’t be business as usual.”
