The South West chapter of Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria has directed all its members in the zone to henceforth, increase the pump price of Premium Motor Spirit, otherwise known as petroleum to N150 per litre.

The official pump price had been N143 per litre.

IPMAN South-West Zonal chairman, Alhaji Dele Tajudeen, who spoke with journalists on Thursday, in Abeokuta, said the directive became necessary in order to avert the planned shutdown of the filling stations across the zone.

Tajudeen said IPMAN took the decision due to a new price regime announced by the Petroleum Product Pricing Regulatory Agency.

The PPPRA had increased the depot price of the product from N133.72k to N138.62k without consulting with other critical stakeholders like IPMAN.

While berating the PPPRA for what he described as “policy inconsistency”, Tajudeen lamented that PPPRA’s new depot price has subjected IPMAN members to a serious dilemma.

He said after careful deliberations and consideration of many factors, IPMAN zonal Executive Committee arrived at the conclusion of increasing the pump price to N150 rather than joining saboteurs at creating artificial scarcity of the product.

The Downstream Subsidiary of NNPC, Petroleum Products Marketing Company had on Tuesday, in a memo signed by its Manager, Sales, Mohammed Bello, fixed ex-Depot of petrol to N138.62 per litre with effect from August 5, 2020.

Tajudeen said, “After careful deliberations and consideration of many factors, the IPMAN Zonal officers hereby declared that all its members should henceforth increase their pump price to N150 and shelve the plan of total close down of petrol stations across the South West.

“The PPPRA is inconsistent and unorganised in dealing with the stakeholders. The normal thing to have done was to involve marketers, and other parties before announcing any increment.

“Even after announcing the new ex-depot price, they should have fixed the pump price for marketers to prevent unnecessary debt.

“It is very disheartening to hear that a new price regime is coming to effect, without considering the plight of marketers who bought these products at an expensive price.”