PHRC Boss Wants Re-Constitution Of Monitoring Committee

The managing Director, Port Harcourt Refinery Company, Mr. Tony Ogbuigwe has advocated the re-constitution of the Petroleum Monitoring Task Force to check the movement of trucks loading the products to their given destinations, especially kerosene.

Mr. Ogbuigwe who spoke in an interview with The Tide at the Port Harcourt International Airport, Omagwa wondered how the PHRC loads a minimum of 40 trucks of kerosene daily and people in the Eastern part of the country still experience high cost of the product.

He said: “Kerosene scarcity and the high price of the product is artificial. It is a way of jacking up the price. We load a minimum of 40 trucks of kerosene every day so that it will be available for sale to the common people in all the states in the East”.

According to him task forces should be put in place to check the diversion of fuel and kerosene and the movement of trusks, adding “when the trucks are loaded, they are supposed to be delivered to their given destinations and ensure they arrive at the right places”.

The PHRC boss stressed the need to sanction owners of any trucks that divert petroleum products, pointing out that the company distributes on daily basis 87 trucks of PMH, 46 trucks of PGK-Kerosene and 41 trucks of PGO.

Ogbuigwe noted that talks are in top gear between the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and various companies for the establishment of three new refineries in Bayelsa State. Kogi State and in one of the Western States, saying that “it’s better for our country to refine Petroleum products and even sell the finished products instead of selling crude oil”.

“No country throughout the world becomes rich through selling only primary products such as crude oil, palm oil, and cocoa only rather, the real wealth is made in producing , processing and selling the finished products. This will help to provide jobs, grow the economy and create wealth”, he emphasised.

Ogbuigwe explained that the price at which fuel is sold depended on the price of crude oil, pointing out that many companies issued with licenses to build refineries by the federal government could not do so. because they found that it is not profitable to them just as he said that the N65.00 pump price of fuel is artificial fixing.

Shedie Okpara