By Ahmed ‘Lateef
The Kwara State Council of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has urged the state government to institute a task force to monitor the diversion of fuel otherwise known as Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) that has aggravated shortage of the commodity in the state.
It alleged that certain major marketers have chosen to divert between 60 and 70 percent of petrol to private owned filling stations in the state because their mother companies must not know they dispense above authorized price.
In a statement issued in Ilorin, the state NLC Chairman, Comrade Issa Aliyu Ore, said the unwholesome activities of the fuel dealers had led to a steep rise in the number of black marketers within the Ilorin metropolis who sell fuel at outrageous prices.
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 at 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 the premium motor spirit supplied to the state and as well as the filling stations billed to receive them.
The NLC boss also appealed to the government to announce on radio quantity of fuel supplied to the state on daily basis amidst the shortage of the commodity.
Ore tasked the state government to work in concert with the relevant agencies in the downstream subsector of the oil industry to put a stop to sales of fuel in kegs pending an end to the lingering crisis.
The NLC Chairman also expressed concern over the loss of productive man-hour daily due to indiscriminate queues for petrol in a few filling stations in the metropolis and called for the deployment of personnel of Kwara State Road Traffic Management Authority (KWARTMA) to curb traffic gridlock that is often associated with queues.