The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) said it would be almost impossible for the Pipelines and Products Marketing Company (PPMC) to stabilise fuel supply across the country, unless repositioned by the Federal Government to allow for efficiency in petroleum products’ distribution and equal pricing across the country.
According to the trade union, PPMC was not only central to the distribution of refined petroleum products, but also central to the efficient and effective performance of the refineries as it supplies crude oil, which is the feedstock for the refinery operations.
“PPMC has depots in Port Harcourt, Enugu, Calabar, Aba, Gombe, Yola, Ibadan, Ilorin, Makurdi and other major state capitals throughout the federation, but most of the pipelines lack petroleum products due to vandalism,” the union said, adding that if the company was repositioned and the pipelines function as they should be, there would be more jobs and reduced pressure on Nigerian roads.
Francis Johnson, president of PENGASSAN, who said the repositioning of the pipeline company required urgent attention, listed some of the challenges affecting the effective and efficient operations of the company to include insecurity of pipelines and staff of the company. He also named inadequate funding, ageing equipment, supply of substandard operational equipment, shortage of manpower and irregular capacity building for existing staff of the company and lack of reliable fire trucks and good safety standards as the other factors militating against efficient delivery.
The union noted that the greatest challenge confronting the PPMC had been vandalism of pipelines by criminals and economic saboteurs.
Explaining the implications of the challenge, the president said that “the negative impacts of the pipeline vandalism on the nation’s economy and the oil and gas industry are enormous. Such include non-functionality of existing refineries, increased operational cost, job losses, reduction in investments in the downstream sub-sector and inability to attract new investment, and inadequate supply/availability of refined petroleum products in other parts of the country.
