Date: 2016-12-23

...scarcity responsible for price hike - IPMAN

Price of Automotive Gas Oil (AGO) popularly known as Diesel has reached its all time high as it was sold for between N205 and N245 on Wednesday.

Pilot Business observed that most of the filling stations that had the product in stock had hiked its price per litre. Long queues were seen at the filling stations dispensing the product as at yesterday evening .

Speaking on the development, the state chapter of Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) attributed the price increase to scarcity of the product.

The state Chairman of the association, Mal. Abdulrasheed Olopade said, "The product which is totally deregulated by government is not available in both government and private depots in Lagos.

"The price of little supply in few depots has increased astronomically. In fact, we are buying at some depots at the rate of N200 per litre including government owned depot.

"At this festive period the product is highly demanded by customers, therefore, both the marketers and the sellers are fixing price to make profit by all means," he further explained.

He however stressed that the only factor that can bring down the price is availability of the product in the depots. The chairman stressed that when the product is everywhere marketers will have no choice than to reduce price.