The Natural Oil and Gas Suppliers Association of Nigeria (NOGASA) has warned that unless the federal government provides emergency palliative measures to oil marketers for three months to enable them import fuel, the country would not face an energy crisis by January 2024.
In a communiqué he read at the National Executive Council Meeting of NOGASA Thursday in Abuja, its National President, Bennet Korie, added that the situation may force many marketers to close shop.
According to the Union, it will go a long way in cushioning the harsh effect of the high cost of importation and equally bring about reasonable reliefs to the business and cost of living generally.
While expressing worries that the removal of fuel subsidy and the volatility of the FX market were taking its toll on oil marketers inability to access forex, Korie said there were increasing losses of lives, businesses and jobs with the accentuation by mass shut down of filling stations and packing up of petroleum tankers, all due to unattainable high cost of importation, lifting, transportation and distribution of petroleum products.
“Similarly, Depot Owners are so terribly affected by the increasing cost of the crude and exchange rate to the extent that many Depots are practically deserted as their owners are unable to secure Bank loans to fund their business due to high interest rates. Banks are not willing to guarantee funds release to stakeholders as a result of the difficulty, instability and galloping rates of foreign exchange and high cost of the Dollar. Many Depots are presently dried up or out of stock, and this is no gainsaying as it is evidently verifiable.
He insisted that owners of filling stations find it extremely difficult to secure funds to procure products for their retail outlets as both the Independent and Major Marketers were terribly affected adding that filling stations were shutting down because of their inability to secure funds to facilitate orders for their stations.
The NOGASA President urged the federal government on the maintenance of roads across the country in order to make distribution of petroleum products seamless.
Therefore road networks and maintenance need to be positively impactful as it will also create thousands of jobs for jobless youths and other restive people in our communities.
He said the dollarization of the economy was severely harming the country as businesses are dying and the system is not helping us at all.
He insisted that urgent action is highly required to save our industry from total collapse.
