The federal government has approved N17 billion for the installation of devices to monitor the movement of refined petroleum products across the country.
While addressing journalists at the end of the federal executive council meeting on Wednesday, Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu, minister of state for petroleum resources, said the installation of the devices will last for three years.
The project is expected to be carried out under the Petroleum Equalisation Fund.
“The narrative is that we have all struggled with this whole subsidy payment and how much is consumed in Nigeria, volumes of products moved out illegally and the whole impact on federation accounts allocation committee,” Kachikwu said.
“The essence of what PEF is doing is that this will enable us to track refined petroleum products’ movement from the point of the LC (Letter of Credit) opening from the vessels that come into Nigeria, up until the point where they are discharged into tanks in Nigeria; and from the tanks into trucks in Nigeria.
“We will also monitor the trucks till they deliver the products into the storage tanks for the filling stations and they are discharged and sold. So, that will produce a 100% holistic monitoring of these products.”
According to the minister, this would allow the government to ascertain the actual consumption of petroleum products consumed by Nigerians.
“There has been so much going on in terms of the movement of consumption numbers from over 30 million litres a day to 70 million litres to 80 million litres a day during the difficult times. And the challenge the president has given me is to rein that in. Let us know what we consume in reality; let us know where these products are going and this process will be able to track every truck.
“So, a typical truck will be licensed with a driver, with a transport company; so, if a truck misses, you can find the transporter and the company that takes responsibility. We expect this to be over a period of three years but we promise that within one year, the real effects of this will begin to show.” - TheCable
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