The Group Chief Executive of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, Mr Bayo Ojulari, has blamed the recent rise in cooking-gas prices on a temporary disruption to loading and distribution during the strike by the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria.
Ojulari said this while speaking to State House correspondents on Sunday, after a meeting with President Bola Tinubu.
According to the NNPC boss, the industrial action halted operations for several days and produced an “artificial” spike in prices.
He said, “The increase you saw was relatively artificial because for the period of the strike, movements and loading were delayed by about two, three days,” he said. “And because of that, you see that impact. As things return back to normal, it takes some time for distribution to be fully restored.”
The price surge followed the PENGASSAN industrial action, which was launched over the dismissal of Nigerian workers at the Dangote Refinery and suspended on October 1 after federal government intervention.
Ojulari also accused opportunistic retailers of exploiting the shortfall to hike prices.
He, however, assured Nigerians that as supply chains stabilise, the cooking gas price is expected to ease in the coming weeks.
“As you know, in Nigeria, people take opportunity. With that delay, some of the people that had existing resources and reserves had to put up the price.”
“My expectation is that now that things are back to normal, prices should return to what they were before the strike,” he said.
Ojulari said the Dangote Group’s agreement to redeploy affected staff and the resumption of operations have begun to ease supply bottlenecks.
(Punch)
