Long queues in Nigeria as petrol scarcity worsens

By Timothy Olanrewaju

LAGOS, Nigeria (AA) - Long queues of vehicles continued in many Nigerian cities on Thursday as a week-long petrol scarcity worsened in one of the world's largest oil-producing countries.

Many Nigerians reported waiting at fuel stations since early morning but were unable to obtain fuel until the afternoon.

Alaba Oluwole, a cab driver in Lagos, Nigeria's commercial hub, said that he spent six hours at a fuel station on Thursday without being able to purchase fuel.

"I haven't worked for two days and couldn't feed my family because of the fuel scarcity. The petrol station stopped sales following the rowdy situation there. Everybody needs fuel and lost patience," he told Anadolu.

Most fuel stations in Abuja, Nigeria's capital, have also increased petrol prices from the official rate of less than a dollar to over $1 per liter, according to Tahudeen Salako and Mahmoud Jalo, who spoke to Anadolu by phone.

Peter Ogundare, a researcher specializing in macroeconomic variables at the Faculty of Economics and Management Sciences, Northwest University Business School in Potchefstroom, South Africa, noted that the petrol crisis in Nigeria is already having adverse effects on services and the cost of living.

"The fuel scarcity is affecting services like transportation, food prices, and even barbering because service providers are paying more for fuel and passing on the extra costs to consumers," he explained.

Transportation costs have risen by about 40% in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Enugu, and northern cities such as Kaduna, Kano, and Maiduguri, according to Njadvara Musa, an economist and journalist with The Guardian in Nigeria.

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), the country's oil giant, stated that it has delivered more liters of petrol to depots for oil marketers.

The country has been experiencing persistent petrol shortages since President Bola Tinubu announced the removal of subsidies previously paid for the importation of refined fuel into the country.