As the fuel scarcity lingers, commuters across Ondo State, particularly residents of Akure, the state capital are still going through hard times in search of the product.
Few of the filling stations selling the Premium Motor Spirit, PMS, popularly called petrol are selling at the rate of N220 to 250 per litre which is against the official N86.50k price per litre released by the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPRA).
DAILY POST reporter observed that for the past one week, only few vehicles are seen moving around major roads in Akure – like Oba-Adesida, Arakale, Oyemekun, Ondo Road due to the scarcity of the product.
Already, commercial taxi drivers have increased their official price of N50 per drop to N70 while their other counterparts, the Motorcyclists, popularly called Okada are now charging N80 per drop against their initial N50.
Besides, the economy of the state has remain stagnant since the governor, Olusegun Mimiko has refused to pay workers since the past five months.
“You know Ondo state is a civil servants state and workers are being owned and how are you expecting economic activities of the state to be alive?
“If we are receiving salaries regularly, market women, artisans, Okada riders, taxi drivers and others will feel our impact but since we have not paid for the past five months, they are also affected.
“I can boldly tell you that for the past two weeks, I have been trekking from my house to my office because I don’t have money to take a bike or board a taxi.
“Thank God that my landlord permitted us to farm at our backyard, if not, I would have died of hunger,” a local government worker said.
Bamidele Ogunlana, who is a taxi driver also said they cannot longer take passengers at the normal N50 rate because of the fuel scarcity.
According to him, “my brother, I was at the NNPC as from 4.am and I left the place after struggling to get the product around 3.45pm. How will I work for few hours and be collecting N50 from passengers?
“Even those selling at N250 experience long queues and consumers would be fighting each other to get the product.
“This pain is too much, we want President Muhammadu Buhari to act fast to stop this crisis.
“We know that some people are sabotaging this government because of their selfish interest and they can go a long way to destabilize his government.”
Already, black market is now striving in the state as 10 litres jerrycan now sells for N3000.
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