By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigerians have started to groan over the 5 per cent hike in the ex-depot price of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), otherwise known as petrol by the government.
The new price commenced today and based on a memo from the Petroleum Products Marketing Company (PPMC), a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), consumers may begin to get the commodity at fuel stations at N170 per litre.
This is because the ex-depot price, which is the price at which the product is sold to marketers at the depots, has been increased to N155.17 per litre from the initial N147.67 per litre.
The internal memo marked PPMC/C/MK/003 and dated November 11, 2020, and signed by the Manager Marketing of the PPMC, Mr Tijani Ali.
As a result of this increment, oil marketers in the country would be dispensing the product to retail consumers within a band of N165 and N173 per litre.
The memo read in part, “The EDC may please refer to the management directives in respect of the above subject (PPMC PMS prices for November 2020) as per the attached memo.
“In line with the above, we propose PPMC November 2020 actual prices for PMS with effect from 13th November 2020, as follows: PPMC Ex-Coastal Price for PMS N130 per litre; PPMC Ex-Depot Price (With collection) N155.17 per litre.”
Business Post had reported that the federal government had announced full deregulation of the downstream oil sector, which means it won’t be fixing prices as the prices would be determined by market forces, especially international oil price.
As at press time on Friday, prices of crude oil were down by 0.57 per cent to $43.28 per barrel.
On Monday, November 9, 2020, prices of oil rose by 7.05 per cent or $2.78 to $42.23 per barrel on the news of progress in the vaccine for COVID-19.
As at Thursday, October 29, 2020, the price of the Brent crude, the price benchmark for Nigeria’s grade of crude oil, was sold at $37.56 per barrel.
Yesterday, the commodity was traded at the global market at $43.33 per barrel.
According to the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Mr Timipre Sylva, deregulation will be difficult for Nigerians at the initial stage but will get better in the long run.
He added that since the announcement of full deregulation in March, the federal government has saved over N1 trillion in subsidy.
