The Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR, yesterday assured Nigerians that the country has excess storage of 500 Million litres
of Premium Motor Spirit, PMS.
According to DPR, the country will not face the acute scarcity of PMS, which is fuel that was experienced by Nigerians for some months, especially during the Christmas and New year celebrations.
Disclosing the yesterday in Abuja when she appeared before the Senator Matthew Urhoghide, PDP, Edo South led Senate Committee on Public Accounts, SPAC, DPR Assistant Director on Retail Outlets Monitoring Department , Mrs Ijeoma Otti- Onyeri explained that the 500million litres of PMS in stock which can serve the country for 12 days in case of any emergency interruption or breakdown in supply chain, was put in place as required strategy of preventing what the country went through December 2017 and January this year .
She said, “The 500millions litres is a strategic plan that has come to stay to avoid the type of crisis experienced few weeks back. The 12 days supply strength of it, is generally believed within the sector to be enough to address any unforseen problem of supply imbalance that may arise especially during the time of festivities like the coming Easter celebration.”
According to her, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation ( NNPC) that is solely responsible for fuel importation now , has fully risen up to the required average sufficiency level challenge, adding that issues of pricing and subsidies are not handled by her office but the NNPC and Petroleum Product Pricing Regulatory Agency, PPPRA.
Meanwhile , the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency ( NOSDRA) has warned Nigerians to be wary of oil pollution especially in the water they drink .
The Director General of NOSDRA, Sir Peter Idabor who gave the warning yesterday while making submissions before the Senate committee on Environment, said that one gallon of oil can pollute 4million litres of water .
He said the pollution which largely takes place in the oil producing areas has the potency of affecting people in areas even far away from oil production.