The Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) has issued new operational guidelines in product supply and allocation of petroleum product import permit in the fourth quarter (Q4) and thereafter.
This is even as the agency has vowed to use all within its power to guard against the formation of cartels in the petroleum downstream sector, post-deregulation.
Disclosing this yesterday at a press briefing in Abuja, executive secretary of PPPRA Reginald Stanley informed that 42 qualified Nigerian companies have been granted supply permit for Q4, while listing the new operational guidelines to include allocation of import permit based only on performance and capability, issuance of permit to only companies with depots and the introduction of international independent cargo supervisors.
Others are the enforcement of three-tier inspection mode at all depots, which means the full reconciliation of arrival quantity, discharge quantity and truck-out quantity by the independent supervisors as well as the enforcement of daily opening and closing stock of all terminals by the inspectors.
The PPPRA boss further warned that, henceforth, there would be stiff sanctions for poorly performed companies in the product supply process. Under the new arrangement, he said, an appraisal would be done at the end of every quarter, noting that poorly performed companies in a quarter need not apply for the next quarter.?????
He also informed that a meeting would be held with the Central Bank of Nigeria to discuss the possibilities of the availability of foreign exchange to support marketers who bring in petroleum products following complaints of insufficient foreign exchange.
He stressed that the agency would closely monitor the sector with a view to crushing the formation of any cartel that may arise.
According to him, “there’s the likelihood of cartels in a deregulated environment; it is the duty of the regulator to ensure that the cartels are broken up”. He explained that the agency would constantly monitor the import prices of products in order to guard against exploitation of consumers by marketers.
He warned that marketers with hiked-up price would be summoned by the agency and sanctioned severely to serve as a deterrent to others who may want to follow suit.?????
He, however, attributed the emergence of fuel queues to speculations on the removal of fuel subsidy, assuring that there was no shortage of the product.