Kwara: Marketers Divert 70% Of Fuel Supply To Black Marketers, says NLC
By Stephen Olufemi Oni, Ilorin
The Kwara state chapter of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), has urged the state government to set up a task force to monitor and checkmate the diversion of fuel by petroleum marketers in the state.
Lamenting that fuel diversion by the marketers has aggravated shortage of the commodity in the state, the NLC alleged that certain major marketers have chosen to divert between 60 and 70 percent of their products to privately owned filling stations in the state because their mother companies must not know they dispense above approved pump price.
The state chairman of NLC, Comrade Issa Aliyu Ore, said the unwholesome activities of the fuel dealers had led to upsurge in the number of black marketers’ spots within the Ilorin metropolis.
Ore alleged that while some filling stations with the commodity sell to black marketers in the dead of the night, attendants and senior workers of the affected stations have been controlling black market spots within the town to the detriment of the wellbeing of Kwarans.
He, however, called on the state government to monitor filling stations effectively through the taskforce and take statistics of petroleum supplied to the state, as well as the filling stations billed to receive them.
The NLC boss also appealed to the government to announce on radio stations quantity of fuel supplied to the state on daily basis to safeguard the diversion of the product.
Ore tasked the state government to work in concert with the relevant agencies in the downstream sub sector of the oil industry to put a stop to sales of fuel in kegs pending an end to the lingering crisis.