As the scarcity caused by withdrawal of methanol-blended petrol into the country eases off, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Ltd, NNPC, has released details of how it distributed a total of 387.59 million litres of Premium Motor Spirit, PMS, in one week to bridge the gap.

According to NNPC, the petrol, distributed to Nigerians through retail filling stations from February 14 to 20, 2022, represents an average daily distribution of 55.4 million litres.

A breakdown of the NNPC weekly national evacuation report released yesterday, showed that 80 per cent of all the PMS took place at 20 high loading depots, while 20 per cent took place at the other loading depots.

The NNPC said the top 20 high loading depot used are Pinnacle-Lekki  which evacuated the highest volume of 70.8 million litres; NIPCO (22.6 million litres), AITEO (22.3 million litres), Swift (16 million litres), 11 PLC (15.9 million litres), Bovas Bulk (15 million litres) and Frado (14.6 million litres).

Others are Keonamex  )13.7 million litres), MRS Ltd (11.9 million litres), Rainoil (11.6 million litres), AYM Shafa (11.2 million litres), TSL (11.2 million litres), Rainoil Lagos (11.2 million litres), and Matrix (10 million litres), Conoil Lagos (9.7 million litres), AA Rano (8.8 million litres), Bluefin (8.4 million litres), HOGL (8.2 million litres), Ibafon Calabar (8 million litres) and Mainland (7.5 million litres).

ALSO READ: Fuel scarcity: We did not know that this product contained methanol, We didn’t see it coming – NNPC GMD apologizes to Nigerians 

With the distribution of 385.59 million litres in one week, scarcity of petrol was arrested, with queues drastically reduced at filling stations in Abuja, Lagos and other major cities as selling outlets that had been shut for over a week due to supply gap opened for operations last Sunday.

In Abuja, retail outlets in the satellite towns, such as Bwari, Lugbe, Kubwa, Zuba, Kuje and others hitherto experiencing product shortage were seen dispensing petrol to motorists last Sunday.

The methanol-blended product, according to the NNPC, was imported into the country by four oil marketers through four Premium Motor Spirit cargoes under the NNPC’s Direct Sales Direct Purchase arrangement.

The four companies that supplied the methanol blended petrol are MRS which made the importation through a vessel named MT Bow Pioneer, Emadeb/Hyde/AY Maikifi/Brittania-U Consortium through vessel identified as MT Tom Hilde, Oando through a vessel named MT Elka Apollon, and Duke Oil.

The product was purchased from International Trader, LITASCO and delivered through the LITASCO loading port terminal in Antwerp in Belgium.

In the midst of the crisis, NNPC promised that over 2.3 billion liters of PMS would be delivered before the end of February 2022 to totally arrest the situation.