No fewer than 13 lives, 130 vehicles and an unspecified number of houses have been destroyed in separate gas tanker explosions that occurred in Rivers, Osun and Delta States in the last seven days.

DAILY POST reports that tanker explosions have been consistent in the country, leading to loss of several lives and properties.

The recent occurrences have raised concerns amongst stakeholders who are calling for a better method of transporting all petroleum products across the country.

Recall that on Friday last week, April 27, a tanker conveying Premium Motor Spirit, PMS, otherwise known as petrol, burnt motorists and commuters beyond recognition and destroyed at least 120 vehicles in Rivers State.

Five unlucky persons, including a pregnant woman, were killed in the unfortunate incident.

The incident occurred between the Indorama Petro-Chemical Company Gate and the Aleto Bridge on the popular and ever busy Eleme section of the East-West Road now undergoing major reconstruction by the Federal Government.

Barely 12 hours after the Rivers incident, a gas tanker exploded in Ita-Osin, Abeokuta, Ogun State on Saturday, April 29, killing one person, while about five others were seriously injured.

The incident which also left five vehicles burnt, occurred following a suspected brake failure, after which the tanker rammed into the road culvert and went up in flames.

According to the spokesperson of the Ogun State Sector Command of the Federal Road Safety Corps, Florence Okpe, the deceased was suspected to be the motorboy of the gas-laden tanker.

On Friday, May 4, about eight persons were killed in a petroleum tanker explosion at Ometan-Okpe community along the Effurun-Sapele Road in Okpe local government area of Delta State.

DAILY POST gathered that a breastfeeding mother and her three-month-old baby were among the casualties.

It was learnt that the breastfeeding mother was burnt to death while trying to rescue her baby who was trapped in the inferno.

Sources at the incident also disclosed that a 16-year-old secondary school girl and her mother who were trapped in their apartment also died in the fire incident.

DAILY POST gathered that the incident occurred on Friday when the ill-fated tanker coming from Effurun reportedly lost control while overtaking another truck a few metres away from the boundary bridge between Uvwie and Okpe Local Government Area.

According to eyewitnesses, the front part of the oil tanker suddenly detached from the rear compartment while on motion, leading to an explosion.

All buildings within the accident scene were razed. Some residents who were trapped in the building were also burnt to death.

Speaking with DAILY POST on Saturday, the Delta State Police Public Relations Officer, Edafe Bright confirmed that about eight bodies were recovered from the incident scene.

He said, “The head of the tanker pulled off from the body of the truck, the vehicle fell and went up in flames, leading to the major accident that claimed those lives.

“About seven houses, five shops, including POS shops, were burnt down.

“Four vehicles, including car, truck were all destroyed by the inferno.”

Governors, FG move to end incessant gas explosions

The 36 governors under the aegis of Nigerian Governors Forum on April 28 said discussions were advancing among them and strategic federal agencies in the oil and gas industry in a bid to adopt safer methods of transportation of petroleum products across the country.

The forum’s Chairman, AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq gave the hint at the Rivers State Government House, Port Harcourt, when he visited to commiserate with Governor Siminalayi Fubara, over the incident.

AbdulRazaq said, “We also spoke with the Head of the Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Agency, and there will be a review of some laws.

“There will also be engagement between the Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Agency and state agencies in terms of ensuring health and safety on these issues.

“As you know, Nigeria relies a lot, virtually, on pipelines for the movement of petroleum products, and we need to strengthen regulations in that sector, and also emphasise on improving and expanding pipelines for the transportation of products as well.”

Similarly, the Federal Government vowed to stop granting licences to gas companies with no capacity to build pipelines for gas distribution.

This was communicated by the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Gas, Ekperikpe Ekpo, when he visited Abeokuta for an on-the-spot assessment of the explosion at Ita Oshin.

According to the Minister, the development became imperative to discourage the transportation of compressed natural gas through the roads.

“I have directed the authority chief executive that for any further issuance of licence, the company should be competent enough to pipe it to their end users so that we are not exposed to this kind of danger any longer.

“As a ministry, we are looking at how we can reduce a lot of virtual conveyance of gas.

“That is why we are putting much in developing the gas pipeline infrastructure so that the transportation would not be virtual, but rather through the pipelines. This will reduce this kind of incident and take off the pressure on our roads”, he said.

Meanwhile a retired officer of the Federal Road Safety Corps, FRSC, Danjuma Alkali told DAILY POST on Saturday that the best way to stop the ugly occurrence was to ban night travels.

According to him, most of the incidents occurred due to “inability of drivers to have enough rest at night”, stressing “the incidents either happened in the night or when the drivers were totally exhausted”.

According to him, if there was a piece of legislation declaring an outright ban on night travels, the FRSC would be in a position to curb vehicles, whether big or small, travelling at night.

“Even before the recent incidents, statistics had shown that most of the crashes happen at night.

“For instance, a driver will want to go to Lagos and he takes off from Ilorin or Lokoja by 5pm; does a person get to Lagos before it becomes very late?

“If the federal lawmakers can come up with a piece of legislation to ban night travel, that will assist both the law enforcement agencies and other citizens.

“Banning night travels will put an end to some of these issues we face as a country, including insecurity.

“The federal government, in its wisdom, created tanker parks all over the country so that when it is night, the drivers can pack and rest until the following day, yet, most of them still prefer travelling at night.

“Nigeria should discourage night journeys because when articulated vehicles, especially fuel tankers, break down at night, drivers of such vehicles tend to abandon them on the road without any sign of caution and this has caused several incidents,” he stated.

The Attorney General of the Federation, AGF, and Minister of Justice, Prince Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, has promised a review of the law punishing suicide attempts.

He gave the promise when he received a delegation from the Asido Foundation, a non-governmental organisation promoting mental health advocacy and reforms to improve awareness, reduce stigma and discrimination and empower persons with mental disorders and their families.

The AGF said health is one of the priority areas of the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

“The law is something we have to take a second look at, especially where it is established that the offenders are not in the right state of mind. What the offenders need is pity, treatment and love to rid society of this kind of situation. But whatever we do is not binding on the states. So, I will take the case to the Body of Attorneys General,” Fagbemi said.

He promised to take up the issues around the Mental Health Act with his colleagues in the Federal Ministry of Health.

Earlier, the founder of Asido, Dr Jibril Abdulmalik, sought the help of the AGF in reviewing the law sentencing people for attempted suicide and the implementation of the Mental Health Act signed into law by former President Muhammadu Buhari in January 2023.

Abdulmalik said medical evidence had shown that all over the world, 80-90 per cent of those who attempted suicide had a background of mental illness, especially depression.

“It is their sense of hopelessness that makes them get to the edge, where they think they are better off dying. In that situation, what they need is help and treatment, not punishment and incarceration. We know the workload is heavy for our judicial officers. We don’t want them overburdened with cases that should ordinarily go to hospitals,” he added.

The 2023 Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, on Sunday said the Nigerian Government was “solely expediting action on the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway due to the business ties between President Bola Tinubu and Gilbert Chagoury, the owner of Hitech.”

Chagoury is the contractor responsible for the highway project.

Atiku said the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway contract was granted in violation of procurement regulations. 

In a statement signed by his Media Aide, Paul Ibe, Atiku disclosed that the involvement of Tinubu’s son and his associates on the boards of companies belonging to Chagoury presents a clear conflict of interest.

Atiku also claimed that Tinubu’s son, Seyi, is a director on the board of CDK Integrated Industries.

The former Vice President said instead of “enhancing the ease of doing business, the Tinubu government had allegedly demonstrated to the global community that his business endeavours and those of his family would consistently take precedence over national interests.”

Atiku claimed that the project being done with more than $13 billion was awarded without competitive bidding.

Atiku also claimed that the “so-called’ Badagry-Sokoto highway would be awarded similarly at an enormous cost to taxpayers purely because Tinubu had put his interest ahead of the Nigerian people.

Atiku said the demolition of tourist and recreational facilities and other properties within the Oniru corridor, including parts of Landmark, without ample notice, “is one of the reasons foreign direct investments continue to elude the country.”

He added that in more orderly environments, “establishments like Landmark would have been provided with a minimum of two years’ notice to facilitate proper planning.”

In an attempt to put an end to the fuel scarcity that has lingered for about two weeks across the country, petroleum marketers on Sunday advised the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited and the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority to continue its emergency fuel supply for another two weeks.

This came as the NMDPRA disclosed that about 4,000 trucks laden with Premium Motor Spirit departed Lagos depots for filling stations in various states over the weekend to supply the product.

The Federal Government had, through the NMDPRA, on Wednesday said it began a 15-day emergency fuel supply last week Monday to ensure the commodity circulates across the length and breadth of the country.

The government also disclosed that vessels importing PMS would continue to berth at the shore to discharge fuel to different depots, from where the product would be distributed to different filling stations.

In an interview with our correspondent on Sunday, the South-West Regional Coordinator of the NMDPRA, Ayo Cardoso, said no fewer than 300 million litres of petrol were loaded at various depots in Lagos between Friday and Sunday to reduce the queues in filling stations.

However, it appears the queues have yet to ease off to an appreciable level as many filling stations remain shut in Lagos, Ogun, Abuja, Oyo and others due to lack of fuel supply.

Our correspondents report that in some areas where the product was available, marketers sold for as high as N1,000 per litre, thereby causing long queues in stations selling for prices around N600.

Though marketers confirmed that the government was making efforts to reduce the queues in filling stations by ramping up fuel supply, they held that the emergency supply must continue for the next two weeks until the product is available in all the nooks and crannies of the country.

In an interview with our correspondent on Sunday, the Executive Secretary of the Major Energies Marketers Association of Nigeria, Clement Isong, said the depots and filling stations in the country were currently operating from the bottom of their reservoirs, saying more has to be done to ensure the tanks were filled up.

According to data obtained from the NMDPRA, it was gathered that as of Saturday, a total of 118 million litres of PMS was discharged from different vessels to marketers; being over 2,600 trucks if conveyed by 45,000-litre capacity tankers.

According to the data, Fatgbems Petroleum received 13,688,420 litres from the SL Aremu vessel. From Binta Saleh, A.A. Rano Oil and Gas got 27,485,750 litres, while STI Yorkville discharged 49,069,623 litres of PMS to NIPCO, Total, 11 Plc and NRL, through the ASPM jetty.

Also, MT Watson discharged a total of 27,295,511 litres to Bono Energy and Asharami.

According to the promise of the NMDPRA that vessels would continue to berth for 15 days, Cardoso told our correspondent that the vessels were discharging the product for onward delivery to retail outlets across the nation.

At Cluster 1 in Apapa on Saturday, it was said that AITEO was allocated 23 trucks; MRS, 49 trucks; OVH/NRL, 45 trucks; NIPCO, 61 trucks of PMS, and 11 Plc, 77 trucks. Others include Ardova and Total JV.

Our correspondent gathered that the Total terminal in Apapa was programmed to receive the product from Golden Dahlia, from where HOGL Energy also received PMS on Saturday.

At Cluster 2 in Ibafon, T-Time Petroleum reportedly got 25 trucks, containing 1,196,000 litres of PMS, while Fatgbems received 20 trucks containing 780,000 litres of the product.

Eighteen trucks of 598,000 litres were allocated to Techno Oil and Bono received 32 trucks of 1,535,000 litres. MRS Limited also got 170 trucks of 8 million litres from Ibafon.

Similarly, at Cluster 3 in Ijegun, the Pinnacle Oil and Gas was allocated 312 trucks and A.A. Rano got 129 trucks of PMS, 111 trucks of which were loaded on Friday.

The PUNCH reliably gathered that 128,236 metric tonnes of PMS, about 170 million litres, was awaiting haulage as of Saturday. The haulage was meant to be carried out by MT Keonamex, 20,172MT; MT Stena Immaculata, 18,955MT and MT STI Stability 89,109MT.

On Sunday, Cardoso informed our correspondent that T-Time Petroleum loaded 20 trucks of 1,000,000 litres; Fatgbems got 42 trucks of 1,850,000 litres; Techno Oil received nine trucks of 347,001 litres; Bono Energy, 22 trucks of 1,004,000 litres, while MRS Ltd loaded 180 trucks, being 8,500,000 litres of petrol.

In all, it was gathered that about 4,000 trucks of PMS flooded filling stations between Friday and Sunday.

Cardoso disclosed that six PMS vessels berthed across six jetties on Sunday, four out of which discharged a total of 187 million litres of PMS.

“The remaining two vessels that will hopefully commence after completion of the protocol prescribed in the SOP for Jetty Operations are laden with approximately 150 million litres,” he said.

The NMDPRA regional coordinator said he and his team have been on the field to ensure even distribution of the products, assuring Nigerians that PMS would soon get to all filling stations.

While warning against panic buying, Cardoso said the agency would continue to monitor the situation to ensure strict compliance.

 Ex-depot prices

Cardoso also released the ex-depot prices of the product, which ranged from N556 per litre to N645.

The ex-depot price is the price of a product, in this case, petrol, at the depot or storage facility where it is held before being transported to filling stations.

 In other words, the ex-depot price is the price at which the product is sold to marketers or distributors at the depot, excluding the cost of transportation, taxes, and other charges. It is the wholesale price of the product before it reaches the consumer.

Other additional costs, such as transportation, taxes, and profit margins, are added to the ex-depot price to determine the final retail price paid by consumers at the pump.

According to the data supplied by Cardoso, the NNPC Retail has the lowest ex-depot price of N556/litre, followed by OVH/NRL at N556.5/litre.

Others are 11 Plc, N599; NIPCO, N623; AITEO, N589.50; MRS Plc, N598; Ardova, N585; T-Time Petroleum, N610; Fatgbems, N597; Techno Oil, N600 and Bono Energy, N645/litre.

Marketers seek supply

Speaking with our correspondent, the MEMAN Executive Secretary, Isong, expressed the belief that there was an increase in supply, adding that the queues will disappear if the government keeps the tempo.

He explained, “I think the tanks were really down. So, when you restore supply, the queues will disappear. There are five reservoirs of petrol; the last reservoir is the one in the tank of a car. You can operate from the top or bottom of your tank. In the recent past, petrol stations have been operating from the bottom of their tanks. If a petrol station has two 45,000-litre tanks and it has only five or 10,000 litres, it is operating from the bottom of its tank. That is the second reservoir.

 “The third reservoir is what they call ‘goods-in-transit’. If the supply chain is working correctly, then at any point in time, we should have a thousand trucks on the road delivering products. That is another reservoir, the same thing for the pipelines. If the pipeline is full, that is another reservoir. That is the transportation.”

He added, “After that, we have the depots. If the depots are full, that is the biggest reservoir you have. We then have the vessels, whether it is the mother vessel or daughter vessel. That is another couple of million litres. Sometimes, if the cut in your supply chain is such that one of those reservoirs is empty, it will not be too difficult to come back. But in a world in which all your reservoirs are already operating from the bottom of the tanks; people don’t have enough in their tanks, you don’t have enough goods in transit, you don’t have enough in the tanks of the filling stations, you don’t have enough in the depots over some time; when you have this kind of challenge of scarcity, you really need to flood the market with 150 to 200 per cent of the normal supply for two to three weeks so that everything fills up.”

 Isong emphasised that the filling stations needed to be full, saying there were times in filling stations when trucks would be waiting to discharge because the underground tanks were still full.

“When you have that, it means you have filled up your complete supply chain. But where everything is just at the bottom of the tank, if one thing goes wrong, the entire supply chain dries up again. I think that is the stage that we’ve got to. We need to ramp up supply significantly in the country to about 200 per cent for about two weeks so that the entire supply chain becomes robust again. That way, we can avoid this sort of challenge,” the MEMAN leader stated.

Fillings stations shut

Meanwhile, some filling stations in Abeokuta, the capital of Ogun State, closed their shops due to the non-availability of PMS.

It was also observed that taxi drivers refused to buy from stations willing to sell the products at a rate they considered to be too exorbitant.

This hike in price had however, caused motorists to queue for long hours at a few filling stations such as the NNPC at MKO Abiola Junction as well as its Fowobi outlet, where the product was sold for N600/litre.

Our correspondents report that black marketers were still taking advantage of the situation to make brisk business as they sold for between N1,000 and N1,500/litre.

Commercial drivers in the state capital told our correspondent that some of them slept at the few filling stations selling below N700.

When one of our correspondents visited some fuel stations along the Ikotun-Idimu-Egbeda axis, it was observed that two fuel station outlets belonging to the NNPC Retail along the College Bus Stop were selling.

Our correspondents report that one of the NNPCL outlets on the same axis that witnessed a very long queue was selling the product for N680/litre, while the other one with no queues was selling for N840/litre.

An attendant at the outlet that was selling for N840, who gave her name simply as Mary, said, “We are independent marketers, so everyone is selling according to how they bought. The other outlet is a major marketer that is why it is selling for N680/litre”.

Our correspondents report that queues persist in petrol Stations owned by major marketers in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital, on Sunday.

It was observed that long queues of vehicles were common in stations such as NNPC, Total, MRS and Conoil. However, the supply of fuel in the town has improved as stations owned by the major marketers sold PMS between N580 and N650/litre.

Some independent marketers including Amorry, MKJ, Neemam and Tigress were selling fuel for an average of N1,000/litre as vehicles moved in and out of the stations freely without experiencing any delay.

In Sokoto State, the scarcity of petroleum continued as of Sunday, with one litre selling at the rate of N1,150 naira in most of the filling stations.

One of our correspondents who monitored the situation in the state on Sunday gathered that none of the major marketers in the metropolis dispensed the product.

It was observed that almost all the independent oil marketers in the state opened for business, selling a litre of PMS above N1,000. Also, black marketers sold the product for N1,400/litre on Sunday.

Nigerians have continued to appeal to the President Bola Tinubu-led administration to take urgent actions to put an end to the fuel scarcity, which they said is already inflicting more hardships on them.