By Obas Esiedesa

THE Chairman of Major Oil Marketers Association of Nigeria, MOMAN, Mr Adetunji Oyebanji has explained that it was wrong for anyone to insinuate that oil marketers will enrich themselves to the detriment of consumers if petrol subsidy is removed, noting that marketers will be unable to fix pump price arbitrarily.

Oyebanji who spoke at a penal session at the Nigeria Oil and Gas Conference in Abuja stressed that competition would be fiercer in a deregulated market.

“Nobody can fix price at an outrageous level in the diesel market now, for instance, as buyers would look for alternative supply source”, he said.

He urged the Federal Government to review the deregulation subsidy to end the instability in the sector, adding that “deregulation needs to be an enabler for business growth and investments; not a policeman per se where idea is how to shut down or close what has been.

“It should be something that should call for collaboration between investors and regulators, for more investors to come in. We are celebrating NLNG Train 7 when some countries are on Train 14 for instance; we need to put more energy into bringing more investments into areas like that as it is the key to drive the energy self-sufficiency”.

Oyebanji noted that the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, would create the enabling environment for full deregulation to take place, pointing out that Nigeria was currently in limbo because varying pronouncements had been made by top officials on deregulating the industry.

READ ALSO: NBC honours Oyo oil magnate, CAN President, others

“Gasoline (petrol) is neither here nor there; today the landing cost is around N220 per litre, but it’s being sold around N163 per litre. It is clear that the desire of government is that we should be deregulated completely and have market forces set prices. However, over the years a lot of resistance has come to play, so, we are somehow stuck in the middle.

“But we hope that the PIB when assented to by the president will prescribe an open market for pricing of petroleum products. That will be a significant step in the right direction.

“Another issue is about refining capacity. With the 650,000 barrels refining capacity of Dangote Refinery imminent, it means that we are gradually achieving in-country refining.

“Effort going on to rehabilitate the refineries is also a significant factor that will ensure that we have domestic refining capacity”, he added.

Oyebanji noted that on-going investments in modular refineries would also contribute greatly to the removal of obstacles hindering the attainment of full deregulation.

He explained that Nigeria lacks an enabling environment that would attract investors to develop Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) in the country.

Oyebanji who lamented that private investors were reluctant to replicate the establishment of CNG across the country due to the high cost of the equipment, said although they were seven CNG stations already  in Benin-City, investment in the enterprise has been very slow.

He said: “Some entities have made significant investment in downstream. Nipco Plc several years ago invested in seven CNG stations in Benin. The question is why has it not been replicated across the country. And why hasn’t it moved much faster?

“It always goes down to the economies of it. At the end of the day, anybody who is an investor needs return on their Investments. It is between the availability of the product, pricing all come together because investment in CNG Infrastructure is not cheap.

“It is not like coming up with a bakery. You need a lot of sophisticated equipment to compress the air. You need the pipelines system to move the gas. Obviously there is a requirement for significant investment”.