PH Residents Lament High Cost Of Fuel

Port Harcourt residents in
cluding motorists have lamented the high cost premium motor spirit (petrol) in the preceding week in the state despite efforts by the Federal Government to  end scarcity of petroleum product on April 7 across the country.
Our correspondent who visited most of the filling stations in Port Harcourt and other parts of the state saw  majority of the filling stations closed because of lack of product supply while  few filling stations sold the product between N270 –N300 per litre.
When our correspondent visited the Yaman filling station along the East-West near Eleme junction, the pump attendant simply indentified as Lucky said they are selling at N270 per litre while total filling station, NNPC filling station and Ifenow filling station along Eleme Road were closed down due to none availability of the product.
The Total filling station manager, Mr Samuel Ekpeme said that for two weeks the station has not been supplied or allocated any product, adding that whenever the station receives petrol they  will sell at the  normal approved price per litre.
Also on Friday all the filling station along the Oyigbo road were closed due to none availability of the product. The popular StockGap filling station that sells at the normal rate was not an exception as the manager told The Tide that the station was expecting product on Saturday.
Mr Nelson Emokpane a black market dealer along Oyigbo road said that he bought a litre for N270 at the black market.
However the situation in the state has degenerated to the level were most commuters now cover long distances on foot.
On Friday virtually most commercial vehicles were off the road in search of petroleum product. The few plying Aba road charged high transport fare to meet up the cost of the fuel.
Mr Michael Ogbom also told The Tide that he trekked from Eleme junction to market junction having waited for over an hour.
Also speaking Mr Chuks Nnamdi a commercial driver urged the government to do something about the situation as Nigerians are going through difficulties right now.
He said most drivers have parked their vehicles off the road stressing that families are passing through pains.
However, when The Tide visited the NNPC mega station at station road there was the usual rowdiness that signifiers the availability of petroleum product.
It is generally believed that the situation might improve during the week as the federal government said vessels with 216.7 million litres of petrol had berthed of Lagos jetties and are discharging the product to states across the country.

Philip Okparaji