As the controversy on petrol price hike surges, panic buying has returned to Lagos.
The city woke up to a sudden announcement of a new price guide by the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA), yesterday.
The new announcement contradicted an earlier assurance by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation that the old price of petrol would be maintained.
The federal government, through the Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipre Sylva, has reversed the hike, saying there was no approval for it.
As at yesterday, some filling stations in Lagos were shut against intending buyers.
Car users and motorists besieged others that were open for business.
In the Ojodu and Ogba areas of the state, only a few filling stations sold petrol to buyers at prices in the range of N162 and N170.
The situation was also persistent in several areas such as Lekki, Ikeja, among others.
As many Nigerians continued to lament the effect of the new price announcement, the government has called for calm.
Mr Sylva, on Friday, disowned the increase in the price of petrol as announced earlier by the Petroleum Products Pricing Agency, PPPRA.
Mr Sylva said neither he nor President Muhammadu Buhari had approved the decision to increase the retail price to N212 per litre.
The NNPC insisted its position had not changed and the PPPRA later deleted the post from its website.
He apologised for “distress and inconvenience, the unfortunate information might have caused.”
