The rising price of petrol following the full deregulation of the downstream oil sector continued to generate reactions yesterday, with the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, urging Nigerians to cut back on the number of cars they own.

The statement by the former Akwa Ibom State governor appeared largely paradoxical as it is no news that it is the practice of Nigeria’s elite, the top federal lawmaker not exempted, to own tens of cars in their garages scattered all over the nation and even abroad.

But with the full deregulation of the downstream segment of the petroleum sector this week, independent petrol marketers yesterday set their prices at between N1,200 to N1,400 in some parts of the country, THISDAY checks showed.

The soaring price of the product continued as the Senate yesterday assured Nigerians that it would assess the current increment in the prices of fuel in the country and intervene only if necessary.

In the same vein, yesterday, the leadership of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) asked the federal government to consider subsidising crude oil supply to local refineries as well as special foreign exchange rates for domestic oil supply.

In several parts of Nigeria yesterday, including Abuja, Port Harcourt, Warri, Oshogbo, Kano and Kaduna, petrol was sold far beyond the new threshold the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) set for its customers on Wednesday.

The state-owned oil company had increased the official pump price of petrol in its retail outlets to N1,030 per litre in Abuja from the N897 it announced on September 3 and from N855 to N998 in Lagos.

This meant that in the less than 17 months of the current administration, the price of the fuel has risen by over 430 per cent from May 29 when President Bola Tinubu took over the leadership of Nigeria.

But the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, who advised Nigerians to do away with some of their vehicles over skyrocketing fuel prices, gave the assurance that the lawmakers would step in only if needed.

Akpabio, who spoke while addressing journalists after the inauguration of a remodelled press centre in the National Assembly complex, explained that the nation’s oil and gas sector had been fully deregulated hence market forces would henceforth determine the price of fuel.

He urged Nigerians to embark on belt tightening measures pending when plans being put in place to increase the supply of the products across the country materialise.

He said: “On the recent increase in pump price of petroleum, I haven’t actually assessed what is happening in terms of pump price increase, but it’s not pump price increase, it’s deregulation.

“If you are taking away the consumer subsidy and then you want people to pay for the actual price of what we consume, it means if you have five cars you will now use one or two.

“It simply means that you are going to stop the idea of subsidy in order to make sure that the monies are used for other things. So I don’t expect any increase in pump price.

“I will expect the market forces to determine prices. I would expect that now that the NNPC is no longer going to bring petroleum products into the country, it means those who have the capacity will bring it and the more the products are available, the cheaper the price.

“So at the beginning, it may seem to be an increase in pump price, but I believe strongly that with the production from Dangote and other refineries when they become functional and the fact that it is now open to all to bring in products into the country, I can assure you that we may not even see lower pump prices.

“So please let’s not dwell on the increase in pump price. We will assess it and if there is need for us to intervene we will intervene.”

Akpabio further assured Nigerians that the Senate would ensure their comfort in the best way possible.

“There is no point offering services to Nigeria if we are not prepared to improve on the lot of Nigerians. The 10thSenate is very prepared to change the paradigm and ensure that the future of Nigeria is better than what it is today.

“I pledge before you that working collectively, we will make legislations and the right motions and intervene with the intention to build a better future for all Nigerian children, those born and yet unborn.

“When I say that brighter days are ahead, it simply means that all the wrongs that kept the country where it is will be corrected,” the Chairman of the National Assembly stated.

However, amid concerns over the debilitating impact of rising cost of petroleum products in the country, the Trade Union Congress (TUC) has asked the federal government to consider subsidising crude oil supply to local refineries.

As part of measures to ensure positive gains from deregulation, it said that all petroleum products marketers should be given equal opportunity both to access products from Dangote Refinery and other sources.

The union also said that the federal government should intervene with measures to strengthen the Naira over major foreign currencies such as the Dollar and Pounds as a means of arresting the high inflation rate currently ravaging the country.

Addressing journalists in Abuja yesterday on the state of the nation, TUC’s President, Festus Osifo said the policy of full deregulation of the downstream petroleum sector was not bad in itself.

He argued that what was responsible for the continuous hike in prices of products including PMS is the ill-advised floating of the Naira, maintaining that the country’s currency is presently undervalued compared to other currencies.

Speaking on the economic indices that effect the pump price of petrol in the country, Osifo said that because crude oil is sold at international price, products from domestic refineries tend to be affected by volatility of the foreign exchange market.

“Like I said here, if government today makes a special intervention in that sector by pegging foreign exchange rate for crude supply to Dangote Refinery at 1,200 Naira to a dollar, PMS price is going to crash much more below N700 per litre of PMS.

“So the demand is that government should create a special foreign exchange scheme for that purpose. There is no government in the world that doesn’t intervene in its critical sector, and the critical sector in this case is the energy sector. We shouldn’t leave it to all the vibrations and the gyrations today that we are having regarding our Naira.

“So when that special intervention is done, the PMS price will even go below where it was moved from. It was moved by N800 plus. But when that intervention is done, it’s going to go down to N700,” he emphasised.

Osifo said that TUC had studied the petroleum products supply crisis in the country and summarised them under three factors namely: Availability, affordability and accessibility.

He said: “When we talk about energy security, there are three principal things that we dwell on. One, is the energy available? Two, is the energy accessible? Three, is the energy affordable? These are the three things.

“Because if energy is not available, even when the price is cheap, you cannot have access to it. Even when the price is cheap, you will not have enough supply. That means no availability.

“What is going to happen at the end of the day is that you are going to have speculators. You are going to have the demand. So the higher demand will be chasing very few, I mean, reduced quantity,” he said.

The TUC president said that what is happening now is that the federal government is selling crude oil to the Dangote Refinery at the prevailing international market price which ultimately impacts on the depot price PMS.

“So if that exchange rate today, as we know, is the exchange rate that is bordering around N1,600 plus. But government can intervene in that sector by what we have opined earlier. If that is done, in that case, you are not subsidizing even consumption. You are subsidizing production.

“That will even help Dangote Refinery to even employ more Nigerians and make its operations much more efficient. And that will crash the PMS price to where it was as of June last year.

“So gentlemen of the press, that is our demand to government. Three things. One is affordability. So we must be able to buy this product. We want the price of the product to go even below where it was before. Not just where it was before, but if it will go below, if we attend clearly to the issues that are bordering on foreign exchange,” he argued.

When asked the position of the Congress on the prolonged rehabilitation work at the local refineries, Osifo said that as things stand now, only federal government can say specifically when they will come on stream.

He however noted that the two refineries may not bring the needed relief to Nigerians except the government takes steps to stabilise the foreign exchange rate.

Osifo further spoke on the delay in the implementation of the N70,000 minimum wage especially at the subnational level. While lamenting the sufferings in land, Osifo said that TUC was demanding that states urgently constitute Committees on consequential adjustment to hasten the payment of new minimum wage to workers.

Meanwhile, while in Abuja the NNPC continued to sell fuel at N1,030 yesterday officially, private marketers were selling the product for between N1,200 and N1,400 per litre.

In the same vein, many filling stations still remained shut, even as fuel queues built up in several parts of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and surrounding suburbs. (Text, excluding headline: THISDAY)