The Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) has sealed a petrol station affiliated to the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) located at Wuse 2, Abuja for four months for under-dispensing petrol to the general public.
The DPR also alerted that some unscrupulous marketers were now using NNPC retail outlets to defraud unsuspecting motorist through under-dispensing of petrol despite NNPC’s efforts to retain N145/litre price.
DPR Zonal Operations Controller, Abuja Abdu Misau Abba while briefing newsmen after sealing the station operated by Iluobe Petroleum Ltd, on Wednesday said the DPR had previously closed the same station four times for similar offence before the latest one.
“What they normally do is that in the morning, they rectify the pumps but when they are sure that we are closed from work, they will just under-dispense. This is the worst under dispensing I have ever seen in my career. They are cheating the public —two litres in every ten litres they sell to the public —translate to selling one litre of PMS at N181. We cannot just close our eyes and allow them continue with this sort of activity,” Misau said.
“We have sealed them severally and we have put penalties, which they paid and are comfortable paying, because they would eventually transfer the penalty to the public. We cannot continue to allow them to do that. This time, we would apply the maximum sanction. The station would remain sealed for the next four months, after which, we can now take a decision on them,” he said.
Continuing, he said, “This is not the first time; we warn them, we sanction them and they pay penalties. Just last week, N400,000 was paid to the government and that didn’t stop them from doing it. What they did is that they paid the money and transfer the penalty to the public through under-dispensing, which they do mostly in the night.”
Misau appealed to the NNPC to intervene in the matter because the station uses its name and logo.
“We know NNPC is doing everything possible to make this product available at government controlled price. So, I want to appeal to the NNPC not to allow a business man that does not have conscience to continue using their names and logo to cheat the public,” he said.
“We want to appeal to the public and thank them for their collaboration and information they normally give to us. We want them to continue giving us information and we want to assure them that DPR is alive to its responsibilities. It is not only that we would coming out during the day, we would work both night and day time and also early in the morning, because that is the time the unscrupulous marketers carry out their nefarious activities of cheating the public,” he said.
When contacted, the spokesman for the NNPC said the corporation has launched an investigation into the matter.
“It is an affiliate of NNPC, we will summon the operator to give us some explanations,” Ughamadu said.
“There are two types of NNPC retail outlets. The mega station owned 100% by NNPC and affiliate which the corporation does not own 100%” Ughamadu explained.
He added: “We have seen the DPR seal logo and made all effort to summon the operator and carry out our independent investigation in view to find out what really happened.”