The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation has said the Federal Government will consult widely before removing subsidy on Premium Motor Spirit, popularly called petrol.
NNPC Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Kennie Obateru stated this on Monday when asked to state how long would the corporation continue to sustain petrol subsidy.
Obateru said the decision to keep subsidising fuel is dependent on Federal government’s meeting with labour unions.
According to him, the agreement between government and all interested parties would be reach very soon.
He said, “The government does not just look at economics to determine certain things. So the fact is that the government is not supposed to inflict pains on the citizenry.
“And this is why the government wants to do a very wide consultation with all interested parties so that an agreement could be reached and we expect that the agreement will be reached before too long.”
He gave the assurance that the corporation would not hike petrol price in March so as not to fracture the ongoing discussions between government and the organised labour on the fuel price matter.
It was gathered that the meeting between the federal government and labour, which was initially billed for February, had dragged into March.
Recall that Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency, on Thursday announced an increment in fuel price, putting the new lower price at N209.61/litre and upper price N212.61/litre.
The agency later pulled down the template stating that the new price did not translate into a hike in pump price despite reflecting market realities.