THE Group Managing Director of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Mr. Funsho Kupolokun, said on Sunday that the scarcity of Petroleum Products in the country would get worse following a fresh pipeline vandalisation that occured in the earily hours of Saturday.
Kupolokun, who visited the site of the vandalised pipeline at Ijegun-Imore, Lagos on Sunday afternoon, said that the development further compounded the bad state of the corporation�s supply chain.
�I had to order them to stop pumping products through the pipeline to Mosimi. You know that this pipeline, the Atlas Cove-Mosimi pipeline, is very crucial to the supply and distribution of petroleum products in the country. At any point it is tampered with, it causes a lot of problem in the distribution network,� he explained.
He noted that after the vandalisation that occured on December 8, the corporation could not distribute products for more than three weeks, when repairs were being effected on the pipeline. This, the NNPC boss added, resulted in the current fuel scarcity and the resurgence of long queues at filling stations.
According to him, it was difficult to get products to Mosimi through the pipeline until two days ago.
He said that pumping through the pipeline was stopped abruptly again, as a result of the vandalisation of the pipeline on Saturday.
�What this means is that we have to get fuel to Lagos, through other depots. And this is rather tedious at this point in time when we depend 80 per cent on import for our fuel need. Right now, all the stock in Mosimi has gone down, and that is why we continue to tell people to leave our pipelines alone,� Kupolokun said.
He also disclosed that there was a low fuel stock at Mosimi, estimated at 26m litres, against a national daily average of 30m.
Meanwhile, the NNPC and the residents of Ijegun-Imore have disagreed on the cause of the burst pipeline. While the NNPC attributed it to the handiwork of vandals, the community insisted that it was caused by pipeline rupture due to over-pressure on the pipeline discovered on Saturday.
However, investigations by our correspondent revealed that the Atlas Cove �Mosimi line had been damaged at several points, which have never been repaired but merely clamped, giving credence to the villagers allegation that the point ruptured rather than vandalised.
Most of the residents around have vacated the area for fear of possible explosion, as there is now a river of fuel, which the NNPC engineers were seen battling to drain at the time of visit on Sunday.
Three youths, identified as Taofeek Salam, Shina and Ajibola Johnson were apprehended by the police team on patrol around the pipeline.
Kupolokun earlier on Friday in Abuja said that the NNPC had begun arrangements to dig up oil pipelines around the country and re-lay them offshore, as a means of forestalling pipelines vandalisation.
According to him, the corporation will replace the very critical pipelines, like the Atlas Cove-Mosimi stretch, and re-lay them in a way that people will not have access to them.
He said, �Work is already in progress on scooping and tendering. We would have most of the lines offshore and the onshore parts as short as possible. If you want to vandalise inside water, you are welcome.�
Otherwise known as System 2-B, the Atlas Cove-Mosimi pipeline, which is 76 kilometer long, is a vital segment of NNPC�s transportation network because it takes petroleum products from Atlas Cove, the main import reception facility to Mosimi where the corporation distributes to different parts of the country.
He regretted that the Atlas Cove-Mosimi pipeline had become the most vandalised in the country, having recorded 354 line breaks between January and September 2006, an average of five breaks per kilometer.
Saturday�s break is the third time the pipeline would be broken at Ijegun. The vandalisation is coming soon after a three-day marathon stakeholders� meeting between the NNPC and oil marketers.
The meeting started on Friday at the NNPC Towers in Abuja, and ended on Saturday in Lagos, the marketers and the NNPC could not reach a consensus on how best to alleviate the scarcity.
However, it was agreed that with the problems in Mosimi, products will be distributed through private depots including Folawiyo, Obat and Ascon to enable marketers distribute petrol mainly to Lagos and Abuja.
Sources at the meeting told our correspondent that two vessels of 30,000 metric tonne, or 40m litres came in on Saturday at the Apapa Depot, with another batch of two expected on Monday to help ease the scarcity.
However, in Warri, Delta State, two vessels, African Prince, laden with PMS and MT Sunrise, with AGO arrived the NNPC jetty.
It was learnt that African Prince brought 125,000 tonnes of PMS while MT Sunrise discharge 112,000 tonnes of AGO.