Fuel scarcity may soon be experienced across the country, as the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) threatened to embark on strike.
In an interview, where this hint was given, PENGASSAN’s President, Festus Osifo cited oil theft as the primary reason for the impending strike.
Lamenting the continued oil theft, Osifo blamed soldiers and other security agents protecting pipelines in the country for allowing it.
Osifo, therefore, called for the imprisonment of security officers assigned to protect pipelines from where humongous volumes of crude oil were being stolen daily, stressing that many oil companies were shutting down operations due to this development.
He added that international oil companies such as Agip, Total, Shell and Addax, had stopped oil production in some wells due to the theft, as the jobs of workers in these firms were currently threatened.
His words: “If after this rally there is no traceable progress, as an association, we may be forced to withdraw our workforce from the operating companies, because we cannot continuously send crude oil into the pipelines and at the end of the day the pipelines are vandalised by people who don’t know how the oil was produced.
“Some of these pipeline vandals, when you stop production into a line, they call our members and threaten them, asking our members why they stopped production into the line and that they should open the line.
“So, the lives of our members are even at risk. For someone to have your phone number and call you, that means the person knows you. Therefore, we can no longer condone this, government must sit up.”
How much oil is stolen in Nigeria?
In 2022 Q1, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) released data that showed that Nigeria was losing about 250, 000 barrels per day of crude oil to theft. This did not only bring the total loss to about $1.5 billion daily but has consequently become the possible biggest threat to national development and the environment.
Just as economic woes are exacerbating Nigeria, oil theft by criminal networks and corrupt public office holders in the country is ravaging the economy.
Essentially, with how oil theft is gaining momentum in present times, the 11th largest oil-producing country in the world, cannot meet the quota assigned to it by Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
Meanwhile, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), and the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN), recently partnered to tackle the menace of oil theft in the country.
