Abuja – The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) said the new Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) foreign exchange policy would boost importation of petroleum products in the country.
IPMAN Vice President, Alhaji Abubakar Maigandi, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Wednesday in Abuja that the policy was in the best interest of the country.
“We welcome this policy because we know it will go a long way to help our business.
“It will help to fight corruption in the foreign exchange market, because when the official rate of dollar was N197, we could not get such from the banks.
“We are all buying at over N350 to a dollar, but just two days into the implementation of the policy, the dollar weakened,’’ he said .
According to Maigandi, IPMAN is in full support that market forces should determine the foreign exchange rates.
He advised the government to ensure that economic policies in the country were implemented to make the economy more productive.
On partial deregulation of the downstream sector, he said that so far, it had brought down the price of petroleum products in the country.
The IMPAN leader said that some of the association’s members were currently selling Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) otherwise known as petrol below the official price of N145 per litre.
“Some of our members are selling at N140, some N142 and we know that it will keep changing with time.
“The most important thing to note is that almost all the filling stations are now selling products unlike before where many will not be able to get products to sell,’’ he said
Maigandi called on the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to supply its members the outstanding tickets it owed them.
According to him, the outstanding tickets are worth about N60 billion.
NAN reports that some NNPC mega stations in Abuja are currently selling petrol at N135 a litre. (NAN)