MAN: Halting Petrol Import Licenses Is Nigeria’s Most Significant Structural Victory in 50 Years

The Manufacturers Association of Nigeria has described the federal government’s decision to halt petrol import licenses as the most significant structural victory Nigeria has achieved in its energy sector in fifty years.

In a press statement titled “Fuel Importation Prescription as a Recipe for Deindustrialisation and National Economic Retrogression,” MAN urged the federal government to be wary of neo-liberal prescriptions from the World Bank that could jeopardise Nigeria’s hard-won domestic manufacturing capabilities.

According to MAN, the path to inclusive growth, a strong Naira, more jobs, single-digit inflation, and a prosperous Nigeria is surer when local industries are protected.

World Bank recommendation rejected

The association dismissed the World Bank’s April 2026 Nigeria Development Update recommendation that Nigeria should open its borders to imported Premium Motor Spirit to solve an inflationary crisis as structurally flawed, counterproductive, and highly detrimental to Nigeria’s industrialization agenda.

MAN Director General Mr Segun Ajayi-Kadir said that while the association welcomed the Bretton Woods institution’s clarification that national energy security is paramount, “we reiterate our fundamental objection to the initial premise that reinstating petrol import licenses is a viable, long-term strategy to avert an inflation spike. It is not, and should not be considered as an option.”

Ajayi-Kadir warned that the World Bank’s prescription would perpetually constrain Nigeria into exporting jobs and wealth while importing poverty.

Local refining is the answer

“Halting import licenses and empowering local refining is the most significant structural victory Nigeria has achieved in its energy sector in 50 years. Therefore, reverting to importation is to succumb to economic sabotage,” he said.

MAN argued that true and lasting price stability could only be achieved through local production, where internal supply buffers insulate the domestic market from international crude freight premiums and global supply chain disruptions.

The association called for optimisation of crude oil sales in Naira to local refineries, transparency in the domestic pricing matrix, and acceleration of the Presidential Compressed Natural Gas Initiative to shift commercial and industrial transport fleets from liquid fuels to abundant, locally sourced CNG.

Sources: ThisDay Live, allAfrica, Africa Briefing, Energy News Africa