By Abiola Olawale
Nigerians are bracing for another round of price hikes as the landing cost of imported Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), commonly known as petrol, has surged to N885 per litre, up from N797 per litre just a week ago.
The sharp increase, confirmed by the Major Energy Marketers Association of Nigeria (MEMAN) in its daily energy bulletin released on Wednesday, represents an N88 jump in importation costs within days.
With the development, the price of imported petrol at Nigerian filling stations may increase to about N1,000 per litre from between N940 and N970.
Similarly, the Dangote refinery’s ex-depot petrol price is N815 per litre, N70 lower than the new landing cost.
In the past few weeks, the pump price of petrol fell to an average of N860 per litre from about ₦1,000 in January as a result of price cuts by the Dangote refinery.
The landing cost fell from about N927 below Dangote’s ex-depot price, forcing the refinery to react with a price cut.
This also comes following Dangote Refinery’s decision to halt petroleum products sales in Naira.
The refinery had announced that the decision which is effective immediately, stemmed from what it described as an imbalance between the refinery’s dollar-denominated crude oil procurement costs and its Naira-based sales revenue.
It would be recalled that the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) had reportedly halted its Naira-for-crude oil swap deal earlier this month.
The development also comes in contrast to a policy initiated in October 2024, when the federal government approved crude oil sales to local refineries in Naira to ease pressure on foreign exchange reserves and stabilize fuel prices.
