Monday was hellish for motorists and passengers seeking to commute to their various places of work in Abuja as premium motor spirit, PMS, popularly called petrol was not available, resulting in far less number of vehicles plying the roads. The effect of the fuel scarcity which started on Thursday last week fully manifested itself on Monday, leaving commuters stranded.
The situation has become chaotic that all the filling stations situated along the ever busy Kubwa expressway were without the product. At the Central Business District, but for the NNPC mega filling station in the area, most other filling stations were out of stock early on Sunday, leaving long queues of vehicles stretching into distances.
At Shafa filling station in Dutse Makaranta area of the FCT, a fuel attendant who pleaded anonymity told DAILY POST that he gathered from NUPENG members supplying PMS to his station that the Federal Government is gradually reverting to the old price of N97 owing to the appreciation in the global price of the product.
Debunking rumours that marketers are the ones behind the fuel scarcity, the source insisted that the nation is experiencing an obvious shortage due to poor supply of the product.
His words, “We are not responsible for the scarcity. We have received fuel from depot only once in two weeks. So how can anyone attribute the shortage to we, marketers?”
At the Mobil filling station around Dutse-First Gate, a motorist who gave his name as Abdullahi Musa, decried the unavailability of the petroleum product at a time politicians would want Nigerians to vote for them.
Speaking with our correspondent towards evening on Saturday, he asked, “What are they (the politicians) campaigning for when we have been on this queue since morning without being sure of getting the product?”
Musa lamented further that “things are extremely difficult for the average man. Many of us coming from the Bwari axis this morning had a tough time passing through the different road blocks. In each of the checkpoints manned by soldiers and policemen, one painfully spends nearly one hour, yet there is no fuel. We really wonder what would come out from all these.”
An angry motorist simply identified as John, who could not secure PMS from the Oando fuel station in Utako, claimed the scarcity of the product is artificial as it was aimed at creating chaotic atmosphere and panic among Nigerians in order to “divert attention from Federal Government’s covert plan to scuttle the coming elections.”
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