IN SHORT: The price of petrol in Nigeria has risen sharply since May 2023 to as high as N897 per litre. However, claims that the NNPC has shared places where it can be bought for as little as N200 are false.
Nigeria's president Bola Tinubu announced the end of fuel subsidies in May 2023, shortly after taking office. This resulted in a sharp rise in the price of petrol.
Before the announcement, petrol sold for about N197 per litre, but immediately after, the price rose to between N480 and N570 per litre, and further to N617 per litre by July 2023.
In September 2024, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited increased the price of petrol to N897 per litre after the newly built Dangote refinery announced the introduction of its petrol into the local market.
The Dangote Petroleum Refinery is a US$20 billion private refinery in Lagos, Nigeria, owned by the country's richest man, Aliko Dangote.
The NNPC Ltd said the latest price increase became necessary because the cost of supplying petrol was putting a financial strain on the company and threatening the sustainability of fuel supply in the country.
But some Facebook posts claim that the state oil company has announced a place where Nigerians can buy petrol at N200 a litre.
One of the Facebook posts reads: "NNPC shares locations to buy fuel price at N200 as filling stations adjust pumps."
The same claim appeared on Facebook here, here and here. (Note: See other instances of the claim at the end of this report).
But has the NNPC announced where people can buy petrol at a fraction of current prices? We checked.
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No evidence of such announcement by NNPC
A search of the NNPC's official website and social media handles found no evidence of this claim.
No credible news agency has reported such an order from the oil company. Such a move would have grabbed both local and international headlines, given the widespread public interest in the issue.
In a statement on its official X handle, NNPC highlighted the estimated retail prices of petrol from the Dangote refinery.
The estimated pump price for Lagos was N950.22, with prices varying elsewhere in the country.
The state-owned oil company added that September's purchase from the refinery would be in US dollars, while subsequent purchases on 1 October would be in naira, with any discount from the refinery passed on to the people.
We found no evidence that the NNPC shared the information contained in the Facebook posts.
The false claim also appeared here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.
