DPR seals 17 filling stations for diverting fuel
THE Department of Petroleum Resource (DPR) Gombe/Bauchi Field office has sealed 17 filling stations in the two states over sharp practices while dispensing petroleum products to unsuspected customers.
The officer in charge of retail outlets and monitoring of the DPR, Mr. Banard Amos, who led the inspecting team on a routine exercise, told reporters in Gombe, that some independent marketers and one NNPC retail filling station were found to be fully involved in selling above the regulated pump price, hoarding, diversion and selling in jerry-cans to black marketers.
The NNPC retail filling station in Gombe was sealed following hoarding of Petroleum product in DPK tank, and SID Oil and Gas Nigeria Ltd in Azare of Bauchi State, and 15 others were also sealed for hoarding 31,000 litres of PMS and selling above pump price.
Amos said the punishment may not be stringent enough to serve as a deterrent to defaulters but explained that the DPR was constrained to be mild because of the high demand for petroleum products.
He said that the Department would intensify surveillance of retail outlets with the view to sanitizing the activities of marketers, adding that the objective for doing that is not to punish marketers, but to educate and remind them so that all of their operations would be conducted within the ambient of the petroleum laws and regulations.
He also advised the marketers to exercise caution while discharging petroleum products, ensure that earthing cables functionality is ascertained and trucks well earthed before the commencement of product discharge into the underground tanks.
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