Independent petroleum marketers, who control over 70 percent of filling stations nationwide, disclosed on Saturday that despite the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited starting the distribution of Premium Motor Spirit from the Dangote Petroleum Refinery a week ago, most stations across the country are yet to receive the product.
Speaking with The PUNCH, these marketers confirmed they had not yet obtained petrol from the Dangote refinery through NNPC, despite their significant presence in the sector.
When asked if most independent dealers had begun receiving the product from the $20 billion Lekki-based facility, Abubakar Maigandi, the National President of the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria responded, “We are waiting to start.”
NNPC officially began loading petrol from the 650,000 barrels-per-day Dangote Petroleum Refinery last Sunday.
The national oil company initially announced plans to load 16.8 million litres of petrol daily from the plant, a figure slightly lower than the 25 million litres Dangote had earlier stated it would release to NNPC each day.
According to NNPC’s spokesperson, Olufemi Soneye, over 70 trucks carrying PMS left the Dangote refinery on the first day of loading for the domestic market.
Since then, the NNPC has continued to lift products from the plant and directed major marketers to collect petrol in accordance with specific agreements. However, as of Saturday, it was confirmed that independent marketers had not yet received any supply of Dangote petrol.
NNPC, currently the sole off-taker of PMS from the Lagos-based refinery, did not provide an immediate explanation for why IPMAN members had not been granted access to the product from the Dangote refinery.
The National Publicity Secretary of IPMAN, Chief Ukadike Chinede, also confirmed that their members were still waiting for petrol supply from the Dangote refinery via NNPC.
When asked if most IPMAN-operated filling stations had started receiving Dangote petrol, he replied, “No, we have not started getting Dangote fuel from NNPC. As of this time, we haven’t.”
He further explained, “The current situation is that NNPC is still serving us with their imported products. That’s what we are loading for now, and they haven’t communicated to us about the issue of Dangote.”
Ukadike suggested that NNPC might be prioritizing its own retail outlets with the Dangote supply, adding, “I think what they (NNPC) did was to take Dangote fuel to their own (NNPC) retail outlets because there was no design for NNPC to give IPMAN products via trucks.”
He emphasized that independent marketers are ready to purchase the product and called on NNPC to release it to them.
He stated, “What we do is self-picking. We use our trucks to pick products. So if we were factored into picking up petrol from Dangote, our trucks would have been at its terminals.”
“But this time, it is only for NNPC mobilized trucks. We are still waiting for further directives, and like I said in other interviews, we are willing buyers and what we are looking for is a willing seller,” he added.
Regarding the high cost of Dangote petrol, Ukadike noted, “I heard that NNPC is selling at N776/litre to major marketers, but they haven’t started selling to independent marketers. When you add logistics costs and other necessary expenses, you would understand why it still sells at the current price.”
He also highlighted that adequate supply could potentially lower the price, stating, “When there is an adequate supply of petrol, the price will reduce. Also, the price of diesel is still high. Once the price of diesel goes down, the price of trucking will go down.”
Senior officials from some major oil marketing firms confirmed that they had begun lifting petrol from the Dangote refinery through specific arrangements with NNPC. They stated that they were purchasing the product at N766/litre from NNPC, though the exact price at which Dangote sold the product to NNPC remained undisclosed.
“As I told you last week, the cost which NNPC sold to us is N766/litre. We paid NNPC, not Dangote, and we lifted products based on the arrangement with NNPC. Dangote and NNPC know the price which they both agreed on, so they are in the best position to state that,” a major marketer, who spoke anonymously due to lack of authorization to speak on the matter, stated.
Previously, NNPC’s spokesperson had mentioned that the company bought petrol from Dangote at N898/litre. However, this was disputed by the refinery, which did not disclose the actual price at which the product was sold to NNPC.
“The report stating that we (NNPC) purchased it at N1,300/litre is false. For this initial loading, the price was N898/litre,” Soneye had stated.
Dangote Group’s Chief Branding and Communications Officer, Anthony Chiejina, denied the claim, calling it “misleading and mischievous” and emphasized that it undermined the company’s recent progress in addressing Nigeria’s long-standing energy challenges.
