President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has approved the introduction of a 15 per cent ad-valorem import duty on petrol and diesel imports into Nigeria.
The implementation takes immediate effect.
The approval is contained in a letter dated October 21, and addressed to the Federal Inland Revenue Service and the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority.
The import duty is said to have been designed to protect local refineries and stabilise the downstream market.
The government described the duty as “market-responsive import tariff framework.”
The approval was said to have followed a proposal by the executive chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS, Mr. Zacch Adedeji.
In the proposal to the president, Adedeji described the measure as part of ongoing reforms to boost local refining, ensure price stability, and strengthen the naira-based oil economy.
He added: “The core objective of this initiative is to operationalise crude transactions in local currency, strengthen local refining capacity, and ensure a stable, affordable supply of petroleum products across Nigeria.”
Adedeji blamed the instability in the market on current misalignment between locally refined products and import parity pricing.
His words: “While domestic refining of petrol has begun to increase and diesel sufficiency has been achieved, price instability persists, partly due to the misalignment between local refiners and marketers.”
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