Heavy reliance on importation and weak Naira have been blamed for the spike in aviation fuel, currently pegged at about N600/litre.
An energy analyst, Comrade Bala Zakka, who stated this recently while featuring as a guest speaker in the Daily Africa Summit, said besides the Ukraine-Russia conflict, fluctuations in the global price of crude oil and weak currency would continue to affect the price of fuel, until there is a renewed effort to refine the product locally.
Findings showed that the essential commodity as of Monday, was sold in Lagos at N598 per litre, N642 in Kano, N640 in Kaduna, N627 in Abuja, N635 in Enugu and Anambra and N628 in Port Harcourt.
“The case of Nigeria, why we are not having enough petrol, enough diesel, enough aviation fuel, enough kerosene is because internally, we decided not to domesticate, because if we have been domesticating and have functional refineries, we are not supposed to be talking about aviation fuel now, but there is no plan in Nigeria.
We know what is happening”. Comrade Bala said.
“Lack of diesel and the cost of diesel have made businesses and strategic sectors to suffer and I can tell you companies income tax will go down this year, personal income tax will go down because many people are likely to be fired. You see what is going on in the aviation industry, they are firing staff, flight cancellations and delays.
We have decided not to deregulate the Nigerian downstream sector of the oil and gas, but predicate it on import which is unfortunate knowing that we have a very weak currency and a very weak economy”. He said.
