As the country continues to reel from the fuel scarcity which ruined the holiday plans of many Nigerians, senators have laid the blame squarely at the feet of fuel marketers and the NNPC. The chairman of the Senate Committee on Petroleum Downstream made this known in Gusau, Zamfara state while on oversight assignment in the state.
He said:
“I have directed all members of this committee to go back to their constituencies to investigate the problem at the grassroots so that we take appropriate measures to address the scarcity. We visited NNPC zonal depot in Gusau to find out the quantity of fuel supplied to the depot and we noticed short supply of the commodity. We are going to present our findings to the Senate. It is very disturbing to see the suffering faced by people due to fuel scarcity in the country.
“We questioned the NNPC over this issue because the Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Maikanti Baru, said they had doubled the quantity of daily supplies of the product, but it is not available to the public. Another unfortunate thing is the attitude of our filling stations’ owners, who sell this commodity to the public. They are involved in one or two malpractices. In fact, out of the filling stations we visited, only two have complied with the government directives in this regard.”
Also speaking on the issue, Chairman, Senate Committee on Public Accounts, Senator Matthew Urhoghide, said the minister of petroleum, President Muhammadu Buhari and his deputy, Ibe Kachikwu should be help responsible for the scarcity. He said:
“Let me ask you, all these people working in NNPC, don’t they report to the President? The Minister of Petroleum is the President and the Minister of State is another person. So, for the ministry, they have two ministers. So, if things are not working in the Ministry, hold the President and the Minister of State responsible.”
