The Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on Wednesday assured Nigerians that fuel scarcity currently being witnessed in Abuja, Lagos and other parts of the country would end latest by Saturday.
Okonjo-Iweala gave the assurance while briefing State House correspondents at the end of the weekly Federal Executive Council meeting presided over by President Goodluck Jonathan.
She was joined at the briefing by the Supervising Minister of Information, Chief Edem Duke; Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Dr. Olusegun Aganga; and Minister of Environment, Labara Malam.
She said the scarcity which had led to long queues of vehicles at filling stations across the country was extensively discussed at the meeting.
She said after proper briefings on the causes and solutions, Jonathan gave specific instructions on how to deal with the matter because he wanted prompt and quick action to improve the situation as fast as possible.
She insisted that the scarcity was caused by a number of factors which included the depreciation in exchange rate.
She said, “We discussed that (fuel scarcity) at the FEC because Mr. President wanted prompt and quick action to improve the situation as fast as possible.
“So, after the briefing and discussion on both the financial and physical side, what emanated is that this situation, we hope will soon be resolved because both on the financial side, action has been taken and it is being implemented through the Ministry of Finance and the Governor of the CBN.
“Let it be known that in December we paid N320.2 billion to marketers to settle their claims and as of now, what we have approved by Petroleum Products Pricing and Regulatory Agency is about N185 billion on Sunday, which we are issuing sovereign debt notes to which is tantamount to having government guarantee that they will be paid.
“But the long and short of the matter is that the financial issue has been taken care of. – Punch.
