The Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Mallam Mele Kyari, has said the price of petrol should be more than N280/litre at which Automotive Gas Oil, also known as diesel, is being sold.
Kyari said smuggling of petrol from Nigeria had impacted negatively on the Nigerian oil sector but added that this would not lead to another closure of the borders.
He said on Tuesday during a programme on Channels Television that efforts were rather being made to curb smuggling.
The NNPC boss said although petrol evacuation by NNPC in Nigeria was currently about 60 million litres daily, the corporation was sure that consumption was not up to that volume.
He said organised smuggling was the reason for the huge consumption volume, stressing that the low petrol price of N162/litre was also an incentive for this.
Kyari said, “Today we are paying N162/litre (for petrol). I am sure many people buy AGO (diesel) in the market and it is selling at N280/litre in the market today.
“So (there is) nowhere in the world diesel sells more expensive than PMS. That means that the price of petrol anywhere in the world, assuming you are going to sell it at the market, you are going to sell it above that price you have seen.”
