The Federal Government has said oil marketers are not free to fix the price of Premium Motor Spirit, popularly called petrol.
A statement in Abuja by the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency said the government had not conferred on marketers the power to fix petrol price.
The PPPRA stressed that the new market-based pricing regime was still in force.
The Executive Secretary, PPPRA, Abdulkadir Saidu, said the attention of the agency was drawn to the several media reports that claimed that the government had removed the price cap on PMS and had given marketers the freedom to fix the price of the commodity and sell above the stipulated price.
He described this as a misconception, adding that the implementation of a market-based pricing regime was first announced by the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, in March.
Sylva had stated that the Federal Government would continue to monitor the price of petroleum products and advise on monthly guiding prices that would guarantee reasonable returns to operators.
The minister had stressed that the government’s role in a deregulated economy was to provide, through the operation of the PPPRA, a pricing mechanism to create a market-driven price regime.
He noted that in a deregulated market, the role of a regulator in monitoring and regulating activities in the sector could not be over-emphasised.
