Going by the fall in prices of crude oil globally, Oil Marketers said on Sunday that the pump price of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) popularly known as petrol may reduce marginally this month.
The marketers stated that since the cost of petrol has been largely determined by the price of crude oil, the recent plunge in crude oil cost could lead to a marginal drop in price of petrol in Nigeria.
As at 13.20pm Central Standard Time on Sunday, the Brent, the global benchmark against which Nigeria’s crude is priced experienced a drop in price by $1.66 or 4.06%.
The Brent traded at $39.27 per barrel at the same time, while the cost of crude in the OPEC Basket was put at $39.94 per barrel. Crude oil in OPEC basket dipped by $1.77 when compared with what it traded on the preceding day.
The National President, Petroleum Products Retail Outlets Owners Association of Nigeria, Billy Gillis-Harry said on Sunday that the prediction of marketers was that petrol price could dip in October. He however
Speaking to our correspondent in Abuja on Sunday night, the National President, Petroleum Products Retail Outlets Owners Association of Nigeria (PETROAN), Billy Gillis-Harry, said the prediction of marketers was that petrol price could dip in October.
Gillis-Harry said, “We will continue to insist that the arm-chair pattern of fixing prices is not correct. You saw the confusion it caused the last time. We are going to have a meeting with them (government) that will involve all the stakeholders. So, hopefully by then we should be able to have a proper information to give to you on the latest price.”
Based on the slide in crude oil prices, Gillis-Harry is suspecting hat petrol price may come down.
It would be recalled that the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency commenced the deregulation of the downstream oil sector in March. Although it provided petrol price bands in some months after March 2020, the PPPRA eventually stopped issuing price bands, with explanation that the downstream sector had been fully deregulated.
