DPR Controllers Meet Over Petrol Diversion

• DPR Controllers Meet Over Petrol Diversion

No fewer than 20 oil marketers have been declared guilty for diverting 162 trucks of Premium Motor Spirit or petrol, causing severe scarcity of the product in parts of the country, particularly in the northern states.

According to the Department of Petroleum Resources, about nine million litres of PMS were diverted by the culprits between January and now, a development that made state controllers of the agency to assemble in Abuja to address the matter.

Documents obtained from the Abuja zonal office of the agency on Wednesday showed that a total of 162 trucks conveying 8,672,572 million litres of PMS were diverted during the period under review.

Out of the 20 marketers listed as being guilty of diverting products, 13 got their supplies from the Suleja depot in Niger State, while seven purchased the commodity from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation/ Pipelines and Product Marketing Company’s Kano depot.

A.Y. Maikifi Petroleum, Gashua, Yobe State, was named as the most culpable marketer, as it allegedly diverted 115 trucks with a total volume of 6,702,582 litres of petrol, which it received from the NNPC/PPMC Kano depot.

The marketer’s status was said to be non-existing and he was fined N1,843,210,015 by the DPR for diverting millions of litres of petrol.

Another non-existing company, Shemraurat Fika, according to documents obtained by our correspondent, was the second highest offender, allegedly diverting 24 trucks with a total volume of 965,004 litres of PMS that it received from the NNPC/PPMC Kano depot.

Commenting on the development, the Public Relations Officer, DPR Abuja, Mohammed Saidu, said the latest discovery was due to intense surveillance by the Special Intelligence Unit of the oil sector regulator.