The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu, has ordered the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to ensure that petrol queues
that has become the order of the day in Abuja were cleared by this week end.
The minister who gave the directive at a world news conference to intimate the Media on the upcoming international oil and gas conference and exhibition tagged the Nigerian International Petroleum Summit (NIPS), on Thursday attributed the queues have been persistent to logistics and policy issues that have remained largely unaddressed.
He said: “I can tell you behind the scenes, a lot of meetings are taking place because the fuel queue issue is both logistics and policy issues.
“We will need to address fundamental policy issues to enable it go away especially in the area where the pricing is showing differentials between the landing and sales price.
“The president is obviously very committed to keeping the price of petrol at where it is because he realises and sympathises with the sufferings of Nigerians.
“I will hate for my colleagues to come and see the fuel queues so my directive to NNPC would be to get these queues out of Abuja.
“The NNPC is working round the clock on this;p if you remember when this first started in December, it was a lot more massive.
“Lagos is fuel queue-free and a lot of the state capitals are. Abuja is still struggling because of the logistics issues.
“I haven’t gone round today but when I went round yesterday there was a huge improvement and I will be instructing the NNPC to do whatever it takes to ensure there are no queues next week.
“Quite frankly, they will have to do whatever it takes to get this eliminated in Abuja.
“That is the directive I will be sending to the NNPC and let them work night and day to put a lot more efforts in trying to do this.”
He pleaded with Nigerians to exercise patient about the fuel situation as there was a lot of re-engineering and efficiency ongoing to address the situation.