FG denies planning to ban importation of gas cylinders

The federal government says it does not have any plan to ban the importation of gas cylinders into the country.

Dayo Adesina, senior special assistant on domestic gas in the office of the vice-president, made the disclosure during an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday in Abuja.

He said that Nigeria cannot make such decision because the country does not have enough gas manufacturing plants to meet local demand.

Adesina said Nigeria will continue to develop the local capacity until it is self-sufficient to establish enough gas plant in the country.

“But Nigeria, with over 200 million people, has less than two million cylinders. So, if you had 20 cylinder manufacturing plants, it still won’t be enough,” he said.

“We have a new one that opened in 2019, two that are shut down and three that have sought approval for manufacturing.

“You cannot ban what you don’t have Banning importation is not going to solve the problem. It is going to worsen the problem.”

Adesina, who is also the programme manager of the National LPG expansion and implementation, said that Nigeria still has a lot of cylinder deficits to fill in meeting the LPG expansion plan.