By IBUKUN EMIOLA

Members of Independent Marketers Association of Nigeria Petroleum (IPMAN) and NUPENG in Oyo and Osun states have announced shut down of their operations with immediate effect.

The petroleum stakeholders, at an emergency meeting held in Ibadan on Saturday, hinged their decision on what they called harassment and extortion of members by the police.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the emergency meeting was attended by the IPMAN Chairman, Alhaji Mutiu Bukola and the Chairman, Petroleum Tanker Drivers branch of NUPENG, Alhaji Hammed Hamzat.

Others were the Chairman, Independent Marketers branch of NUPENG, Mr Surajudeen Adegoke and IPMAN, Vice-Chairman, Alhaji Olalekan Lawal.

They unanimously condemned the operations of the IGP monitoring team on the highway which, they said, had been disrupting the lifting of petroleum products from depot to filling stations in the two states.

The IPMAN chairman, who spoke on behalf of others, called for immediate end to harassment and extortion of members of the associations, said that they would not open for business until the issues were resolved.

According to him, no filling stations will open while there will be no movement of petroleum tankers in the two states until members of the IGP monitoring team are removed from the road.

“A tanker driver bringing in a truck load of diesel was arrested at Gbongon junction in Osun in the early hours of Saturday and detained along with his truck.

“The team has assumed the role of Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) which is the regulator in the sector.

“The NMDPRA officers at the lifting depot had already certified the product, meaning that there was no issue at all, only for the driver and the truck to be detained by the IGP monitoring team at Gbongbon.

“We hereby call for immediate release of the driver and the truck,” he said.

Bukola said that the victimisation had been going on for long, adding that it must stop, in the interest of the industry and Nigerians in general.

He said that in the last few months, the police team had wrongly arrested many tanker drivers and trucks, only to discover that they were innocent after investigations.

Bukola claimed that police extortion had further compounded the challenges facing the associations, thus affecting the generality of Nigerians.

“There will be no movement of trucks in and out of Osun and Oyo states, meaning that there will be no loading of petroleum products from depot to filling stations within the two states.

“The purpose of the IGP monitoring team was to stop vandalism of pipelines but the team has left its function and is now chasing other things,” he said.

Bukola also decried what he called multiple charges which, he said, had been crippling operations in the petroleum sector in the two states. (NAN)

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