Tag: Fuel Scarcity

Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Chief Timipre Sylva has maintained that the Federal Government cannot intervene in the current rise in diesel and aviation fuel saying that  the prices for both products are deregulated. Sylva stated this while speaking in Abuja yesterday. He stressed that the prices of both commodities fluctuate because they are imported and influenced by the changing  foreign exchange rate. “So, it is not within the purview of the government to fix the prices at all. And of course, the actual issue is also the foreign exchange. People cannot access foreign exchange to import this. For the time being, NNPC has been the main importer of this product but what we are trying to do is to democratise the importation so that the aviation fuel users themselves should be able to access foreign exchange and be able to import this product. “It’s not a supply issue at all. It’s just a global problem. You know that the problem in Ukraine and Russia has actually exacerbated the rise in prices; it is not in Nigeria alone. The high cost of diesel is also because of the same reason and these are not subsidised commodities, they are deregulated commodities so actually, it is not within the purview of the government to intervene in the price,” Sylva said.