By Our Reporter
The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) has accused the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) of fraudulently denying its members supply of the products for which they have already paid.
In a statement signed by IPMAN’s Secretary for Private Depot Operation (PDO), Lagos, Mr. Folalu Ebenezer and four other concerned marketers, the association said their members have tickets issued to them for over nine months but for which the products were never supplied in spite of having paid to the NNPCL through their official portal.
The association in the statement said: “The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) wants to state that we are in support of fuel subsidy removal as recently announced by the Federal Government.
“We, however, want the Federal Government to be aware of the exploitation being perpetrated by the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) which is totally against the businesses of IPMAN members.
“Members of IPMAN are always required to pay ahead of products supplies by the NNPCL via Authority To Pay (ATP) generated from the NNPCL portal for product loading at designated Private Deport (PDO). We discovered that months after the payment through the portal for which tickets are generated for our members to load products; we have not been able to load the products.
“Some of our members have tickets up to nine months before the fuel subsidy removal by the FG but have not been able to load products paid for even till now. Before the latest decision, there had been increment in January 2023 in which our members were obligated to pay additional N1,072 million (One million and seventy two thousand naira per ticket).
“Even after the payment of this unexpected increment, our members are yet to lift the products as promised. Presently our members have over 4,500 tickets, including 500 Dynamic tickets, yet to drop on NNPCL’s portal
“After this latest announcement of the removal of fuel subsidy by the FG, the NNPCL is now asking IPMAN members, who already have tickets for the products, to pay additional N13,702,000 (Thirteen million, seven hundred and two thousand Naira) on each ticket to the NNPCL.
“We discovered that the products that should have been loaded by our members have been loaded out to MOMAN and DAPMAN who are owners of tank farm where the products were stored
“We want Nigerians to see the biased behavior of NNPCL to IPMAN members over the years and we demand a stop to this. We in IPMAN say ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.
“Our members cannot be made a scapegoat for what they did not know anything about. Asking us to pay over N13million per ticket as a result of price differentials for money that has been paid before fuel subsidy removal is unfair to our members and our business.
“We eagerly seek the intervention of His Excellency President Bola Tinubu to prevail over NNPCL and to curtail their excesses which are against the growth of our business and the nation’s economy is general. PDO was the idea of the Late President Shehu Musa Yar’Adua in conjunction with IPMAN to escape pipeline vandalisation and myriads of all community violence and unrest. “Marketers from 19 government-conventional depots are doing their business on this platform providing employment to many Nigerians.
“IPMAN controls 80 per cent of downstream sector in Nigeria. Ignoring these demands of marketers may lead to unemployment, bankruptcy due huge debts already hanging on our members.”
“We hereby demand for the release of tickets and products for which money had been paid before the fuel subsidy removal. We say that justice must be done and seen to be done.