Pipeline vandalism, logistics challenges responsible for hike in price of fuel in Aba

The current hike in price of premium motor spirit (PMS), known as petrol, in Aba, the commercial hub of Abia State, may linger for a while, unless drastic actions are taken to address logistics challenges, confronting marketers in the area.

BusinessDay gathers that activities of vandals have increased on the 54-kilometre Port Harcourt-Aba petroleum pipeline, which has made it difficult for the Aba depot to receive products from the Port Harcourt refinery.

The inability of marketers to access the depots in Port Harcourt and Aba due to bad roads, especially Federal Government-owned roads, was identified as another major contributor to the current high cost of petroleum products in the area.

A litre of petrol in Aba currently goes for N110, instead of the official N87.

Simple Nwankpa, an independent petroleum marketer, in an interview with BusinessDay, decried the bad state of federal roads, especially those in the South-East/South-South regions, which according to him had made it difficult for marketers to access the depots, even after paying for products.

According to him, people pay for products and they can’t move in to load products, those that loaded cannot come out and this is due to bad roads.

He commended the Rivers State government for efforts it was making to rehabilitate the Onne Road, and urged the contractors handling the road to increase their pace to ensure its early completion.

He also noted that the Aba-Ikot Ekpene road, a major road linking Abia, Akwa Ibom and Cross Rivers states, as well as an alternative route to Port Harcourt, should equally be rehabilitated.

The Aba depot, comprising 12 storage tanks, was commissioned about 33 years ago with a combined designed capacity to hold about 103 million litres of petroleum products including PMS, DPK and HGO.

The depot serves as a link for product evacuation from Port Harcourt refinery through a 12-inch pipeline spanning 54 kilometres for transmission to Enugu, Makurdi and Yola, which makes it important in the distribution of petroleum products in the country.

However, the depot was shut down in 2006 by the PPMC to forestall the activities of vandals, who cannibalised pipeline facilities to steal petroleum products. It was however reopened in October 2012, after rehabilitation of the depot and pipelines.