As part of measures to stop the smuggling of Premium Motor Spirit, popularly called petrol, from Nigeria to neighbouring countries, the Federal Government has detained five fuel tankers and sealed three filling stations in border towns.
It was also gathered on Sunday that the continued anti-smuggling operations of the Federal Government through the Nigeria Customs Service had made fuel supply to various border communities to decrease from 32 million litres daily to about 25 million within two months.
This implies that about 420 million litres of PMS valued at N294bn (using the average price of N700/litre) did not go to the border states during the period.
The decrease in PMS evacuation to border states by about 21.86 per cent was confirmed by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited.
The National Public Relations Officer, Nigeria Customs Service, Abdullahi Maiwada, told our correspondent that the detained fuel tankers and sealed filling stations had been handed over to the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority for further investigations.
