BY Bunmi Aduloju
The Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited says it is no longer the sole supplier of petrol in the country.
The national oil firm made the announcement in a tweet on Thursday.
“NNPC Limited no longer [the] sole supplier of petrol,” the national oil company tweeted.
Prior to the announcement, the company served as the country’s last-resort supplier, ensuring a steady distribution of petroleum products.
The development comes hours after the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) said it licenced three oil marketers for petroleum products importation.
Farouk Ahmed, chief executive officer (CEO) of NMDPRA, speaking during a meeting with stakeholders, said the NNPC had agreed to reduce its petrol import volume to give room for other players in the industry.
“Therefore, any marketer licenced to import petroleum products must comply with set guidelines”, he said.
“Already, three oil marketers will, from July this year, start importing petroleum products into the country.”
In his inaugural speech on May 29, President Bola Tinubu declared that the petrol subsidy payments had stopped.
NNPC, after the president’s declaration, announced the adjustment of the pump price across its retail outlets nationwide.
Speaking on the post-subsidy era, Mele Kyari, group chief executive officer (GCEO) of NNPC, had said oil marketers would be able to import petrol as the subsidy removal would create an enabling environment.
“The beauty of this is that there’ll be new entrants because oil marketing companies know the result of their reluctance to come into the market all along is the very fact that there’s a subsidy regime that is in place, and that subsidy regime doesn’t have the guarantee of repayment back to those who provide the product at subsidised prices,” Kyari had said.
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