The pump price of premium motor spirit, otherwise known as petrol has been reduced from N168 to N162.44 per litre. The price will take effect from Monday, December 14.
The latest price regime, announced by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr Chris Ngige, came after a meeting with labour leaders which began around 9 PM on Monday and ended at 1:30 AM on Tuesday.
The product is presently being sold at N168 following the decision of the Petroleum Products Marketing Company to increase the ex-depot price of petrol from N147.67 per litre to N155.17 per litre in November.
The minister said, “Our discussion was fruitful and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation which is the major importer and marketers of petroleum products and customers have agreed that there will be a slide down of the pump price of PMS and that the price cut will get us about N5 per litre and that the price cut will take effect from next Monday, a week today.”
He stated that a technical committee has been set up to ensure price stability in the industry, and will report back to the larger house on January 25.
Ngige explained that the price reduction was not meant to suspend deregulation because it did not affect the price of crude oil but on areas where the NNPC as the main importer had agreed that it could cut costs like freight and demurrage costs.
He said the new price slash was a product of a joint committee of NNPC and labour representatives, which looked into ways of cutting costs.