Timipre Sylva, Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, has primed Nigerians to prepare for higher prices of petrol in the country.
The junior minister, who reports to President Muhammadu Buhari, spoke against the backdrop of rising crude oil price, which has crossed $60 per barrel.
Sylvia spoke at the launch of the Nigerian Upstream Cost Optimisation Program on Tuesday and explained that without a provision for subsidy in the 2021 budget, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, cannot continue to bear the cost of under-recovery, which is selling below the cost price.
Petrol currently sells at N160 –N165 per liter, a price that was set when crude oil sold about $43 per barrel.
Although the recent increase in the price of crude oil has improved the government’s revenue, the resources will not be frittered away, the minister said.
“Since we are optimizing everything, NNPC needs to also think about the optimization of product cost because as we all know oil prices are where they are today, $60,” he said.
“As desirable as this is, this has serious consequences as well on product prices. So we want to take the pleasure and we should as a country be ready to take the pain.
“Today the NNPC is taking a big hit from this. We all know that there is no provision in the budget for subsidy. “So, somewhere down the line, I believe that the NNPC cannot continue to take this blow. There is no way because there is no provision for it. “As a country, let us take the benefits of the higher crude oil prices and I hope we will also be ready to take a little pain on the side of higher product prices”, he explained.
