The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, (NNPC) and its downstream subsidiary, Pipelines and Products Marketing Company, (PPMC) said on Tuesday that efforts are being made to restore normalcy to the supply and distribution of Premium Motor Spirit, (PMS) also known as petrol in the country.

Managing Director of PPMC, Prince Haruna Momoh, who stated this when he appeared before the Senate Committee on Petroleum Downstream in Abuja, said the NNPC, PPMC and other marketers are at the moment jointly supplying fuel to the market, adding that the long queues in most filling stations are currently disappearing.

He said, “based on the forty (40) million litres national daily consumption, the NNPC/PPMC is responsible for fifty (50%) percent of the allocation from the PPPRA, and other marketers are responsible for the other fifty percent. The NNPC/PPMC as the supplier of last resort ensured that when marketers withdrew from supplying, the country was sustained with the fifty percent supplied from the inland and marine strategic reserves,” he added.

He explained that the NNPC and PPMC had to dip into its strategic reserves to make the product available, adding that the country has reserves for the next 14 days, adding that with the involvement of marketers in the importation of fuel, the strategic reserve would be restored to 30 days sufficiency by the end of the month.

Momoh also said that the NNPC and PPMC maintained inland and marine strategic reserves so as to ensure energy sufficiency in line with the Corporation’s mandate.[share_this_post]

Responding to a question on the major cause of the persistent scarcity in supply, Momoh said lack of subsidy payment to Major Marketers Association of Nigeria, (MOMAN) and the Independent Marketers Association of Nigeria, (IPMAN) was the reason why initial importation of products was suspended.

Prince Momoh added that with the payment of subsidy claims for third and fourth quarters of 2013 to marketers running to the tune of forty one billion naira (N41bn) recently, the marketers have stepped up supply of the product to the market.