THE Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has initiated a new scheme to ensure smooth distribution of Dual Purpose Kerosene (DPK) across the country.

   The Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Ohi Alegbe, in a stamen made available to The Guardian recently, said the ‘Kero Correct’ initiative would cut-off the several layers of middlemen who make it difficult for the end user to enjoy the subsidy on kerosene product.

  Kerosene is to be sold at the regulated price of N50 per liter, but the consumers hardly get the product at the official pump price, due to issues around the supply mechanism. 

   Alegbe quoted the Executive Director Commercial of the Pipeline and Products Marketing Company (PPMC), Frank Amego, as saying that the scheme was aimed at getting kerosene to the Nigerian masses who use the product as their domestic cooking fuel at the ‘correct price’.

   He observed that though kerosene was the most subsidized product, the Nigerian masses have not been enjoying the subsidy because of the long arbitrage system involved in its distribution and retail, diversion of the product by marketers to the construction industry where it is used for blending bitumen, and the fact that NNPC has no direct control over most of the marketers involved in the distribution and sales of the product.

   “The Kero Correct initiative is thus designed to distribute and sell kerosene directly to end users from NNPC Retail mega and affiliate stations across the country at the government-regulated price of N50 per litre to ensure effective control,” Amego stated.

    He assured that PPMC has enough stock of kerosene and that machinery has been put in place to ensure efficient distribution of the product from Lagos and Oghara to NNPC Retail mega and affiliate stations in every nook and cranny of the country.

   Also speaking at the occasion, the General Manager, NNPC Retail, Ufford Jackson Ibanga, assured that all of the 524 NNPC Retail mega, floating mega and affiliate stations across the country have been keyed up for the Kero Correct scheme.

   He explained that the volunteers were being brought into the project to help monitor discharge and sales of the product to serve as an independent feedback system aimed at promoting transparency and ensuring that the product gets to the desired end users.

   The Chairman of the Kero Correct Committee and Manager Media, Group Public Affairs Division, Nwakwu Uchechukwu Anthony, outlined the three-fold role of the NGOs and volunteers to include monitoring of discharge and sales of the product, ensuring orderliness at points of sales and serving as whistle blowers.

   The scheme which will be officially flagged off soon will involve the distribution of a total of 1,500 trucks of kerosene across NNPC Retail’s mega and affiliate stations across the country to ensure that each consumer gets at least 25 litres of the product over the next three months.