THE price of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), also known as cooking gas has skyrocketed to a record of N560 per kilogramme forcing Nigerians to turn to alternatives such as charcoal, kerosene and firewood for cooking.
The price of cooking gas has risen by more than 70 percent since early July this year after recent devaluation of the naira and lingering inadequate domestic supply of the commodity.
Our reporter gathered that as cooking gas prices maintaines an upward trend in recent months, more Nigerians are discouraged from using the cooking gas.
It was also learnt that some Nigerians do not have prepaid electric meters are now increasingly using electric cookers in a bid to reduce their cooking gas usage.
According to Nanret Victor, a roadside seller of gas at Yantrailler in Jos North Local Government Area of Plateau State said 12.5kg cylinde LPG now goes for N7,500 unlike before which was sold for N4.500.
“The increase in cooking gas price started early January this year and is rising everyday without coming down.” Nanret pleaded with government to look into the matter and reduce the price so that an average citizen can afford it.
According to Abdulsalam Ibrahim, Assistant Manager of Kaisan Oil & Gas Plant at TT & T Junction, the price of gas is so high that, 12.5kg cylinder now sells for N7,000, people are no more patronizing them as before because of the hike in price.
He appealed to the government to look into the matter and reduce the price for the benefit of everyone in the society, most especially the masses who are at the receiving end.
Former Group Managing Director of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), is and Nigeria’s immediate past Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, who lamented that NNPC, spending incredulous sums on kerosene subsidy even as consumers could not buy the product at the then official pump price of N50 per liter.
Kachikwu promised to drive kerosene out of Nigeria’s kitchens and replace it with gas in what he tagged “Cooking gas revolution”. He also promised to flood Nigeria with free cooking gas cylinders and cookers in a desperate bid to compel those at the upper end of the low income bracket to abandon kerosene and use gas.
He said that by the end of 2016, the cooking gas revolution would be taken to Nigeria’s sprawling rural communities where most of the 122 million compatriots will be out of poverty line. In rural communities, 90 percent of the residents cook with fire wood.
Consequently, Kachikwu’s cooking gas revolution was poised towards a grueling duel with fire wood rather than kerosene. Ironically, before he left office, not one gas cylinder had been delivered by NNPC to any Nigerian as the ousted minister promised.
Federal government has priced cooking gas out of the reach of many consumers. With poverty on the rampage and food inflation surging out of control, the only option left is for thousands in urban Nigeria to join millions of their compatriots in rural communities to cook with firewood.
Rural communities fall trees and turn them to cooking fuel despite the consequent de-forestation which the Federal Government grudgingly toils to avoid. People in rural areas and semi urban areas, are even the major target of LPG expansion, it is not a good development.
