The Mobil
boss made this know while speaking with the best-selling and most sought after
business news and articles publishers, Tectono Business Review, after an oil and gas forum in Lagos recently.
According to him, banks are very reluctant in advancing credits for certain oil
and gas projects, after appraising the situations in the petroleum industry especially
the capability of operators to pay back the loan.
In his own
words: “With exchange rate of naira to dollar reaching
N230 at a time before it came down to N198 per dollar, it is obvious that local
operators would find it difficult to operate in the country. The cost of
procuring machineries abroad for projects that are going to be executed in the
country is high and unsustainable. Banks compounded the woes of operators by
not giving them the required facilities or credits. The adverse effect of these
problems on industry is absence of new investments.”
Mr. Oyebanji
said major oil marketers were battling with huge interest rates charged on the
loans they collected to finance the importation of petroleum products into the
country and attributed the rise in cost of subsidies paid to importers of fuel
to interest rates, adding that the non-payment of subsidies is affecting their
operations.
The Mobil
Oil CEO also attributed the challenges bedeviling the operation of marketers to
product adulteration, saying that there were cases where some Nigerians
adulterate petrol by mixing it with kerosene.
He stated that
the development was affecting their business. He mentioned cases of adulterated
petrol in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital and other states in the
country, stressing that the only way to have a fixed price regime in the
industry was when a team is set up to enforce it. According to him, marketers are
selling prices of petroleum products are at different prices and that the idea
does not augur well with the industry.
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