Group Chief Executive Officer of Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, NNPCL, Mele Kyari, said yesterday that the present high cost of petrol will crash in no distant time, allaying the fears of Nigerians about the development.
It will be recalled that the company came up with a new template which fixed the price of the product at between N488 and N557 per litre across the country.
He gave the assurance in an interview on Arise TV’s Morning Show programme monitored in Lagos.
Kyari spoke on a day Amnesty International warned against the increased poverty removal of petrol subsidy would cause in
the country and asked the Federal Government to urgently come up with measures to mitigate the debilitating effects of the removal.
The NNPC boss said competition among major players in the oil sector will force down the price of the product, against the upward trends that had caused panic in the country. He said the removal of the subsidy will allow new This, he claimed, would ensure healthy competition which would ultimately lead to a
downward review of pump prices of petrol across the country. Kyari’s words: “The beauty of this (subsidy removal) is that there will be new entrants (into the market) because oil marketing companies’ reluctance to come into the market all along is the very fact of the subsidy regime that is in place.
“That subsidy regime doesn’t have a guarantee of repayment back to those who
provide the product at a subsidised price and now that the market is being deregulated, oil marketing companies can actually import product or even if it is produced locally, they can buy and take it into the market and sell at its retail price.
‘’Therefore, you will see competition, even with NNPC. And by the way, by law, NNPC cannot do more than 30 per cent of the market going forward. As soon as the market stabilises, oil marketing companies are able to come in.
“Competition will definitely come in and the market will regulate the prices itself. Therefore, this is just an instantaneous price and within a week or two, you will continue to see different prices because of different approaches from major players, companies have different approaches to it and competition will guide that.
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“Ultimately, you’d see changes downwards and it is very likely because efficiency will come in.
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