The pump price for petrol in Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), from.N617 to N897 per litre.
This comes days after NNPCL revealed that it is bearing a burden of petrol price debt
of over $6 billion debt.
When contacted by Vanguard, the company’s Chief Communications Officer, Mr Olufemi Soneye, said he was not aware of any price increase.
“I’m not aware of this. Thank you for reaching out. I have no comment on the matter at this time.
“If there are any updates, I will make sure to inform you. I appreciate your understanding,” he responded via WhatsApp.
Already, many Nigerians have criticised the abrupt increase in the cost of petrol by NNPCL, as other petrol distributing outlets are expected to also hike their price.
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) says the act is a betrayal by the federal government, saying “We are filled with a deep sense of betrayal as the federal government clandestinely increases the pump price of pms. One of the reasons for accepting N70,000 as national minimum wage was the understanding that the pump price of pms would not be increased even as we knew that N70,000 was not sufficient.
“We recall vividly when Mr President gave us the devil’s alternatives to choose from: either N250,000 as minimum wage (subject to the rise of the pump price between N1,500 and N2,000) and N70,000 (at old pms rates), we opted for the latter because we could not bring ourselves to accept further punishment on Nigerians.
“But here we are, barely one month after and with government yet to commence payment of the new national minimum wage, confronted by a reality we cannot explain. It is both traumatic and nightmarish”.
