The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr Ibe Kachikwu, has disclosed that government’s annual expenditure on fuel subsidy has risen to over N1.4 trillion.
Kachikwu disclosed the figure in Abuja, describing the expenditure as “under-recovery” for supply of petroleum products across the country.
The figure represents N3.76 billion daily expenditure, or a 386 per cent jump from the N774million spent daily on subsidising petrol as at March 5 this year.
The Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Maikanti Baru, had given the N774 million figure as expenditure for the importation and distribution of petroleum products in the country.
Kachikwu spoke at a Liquefied Petroleum Gas workshop organised by the Federal Ministry of Petroleum Resources in Abuja.
He said the rising subsidy figure was as a result of the NNPC being the only marketer bearing the financial burden of importing and distributing petroleum products as the country’s sole supplier of last resort.
The minister also attributed the growing under-recovery cost to the large number of illegal petrol stations springing up in coastal communities bordering Nigeria and other neighbouring countries.
Data by the NNPC showed that about 16 of the 36 States of the federation have about 61 local government areas with border communities.
The communities account for about 2,201 registered filling stations operating in their domains.
Kachikwu, however, assured that the challenge of growing under-recovery cost is “being addressed at the highest levels of government.”