I want to bring to the minds of Nigerians how we, the citizens of Nigeria,are to blame for the reoccurring scarcity of petroleum products in Nigeria. Sure, one may argue the role of good governance in promulgating policies and providing facilities, structures and institutions to ensure steady availability of this product. But I want to bring to mind the devastating effects of the attitude and habits of citizens that contribute greatly to fuel scarcity in our country.
Firstly, I want to discuss the "American style" in motoring which we, Nigerians, have copied. For goodness sake, no country that wants to survive copies American Motorization policies. In Nigeria today American cars are trending, yes they have got good car designs but let's know America has her own version of everything. Nigerian people don't consider cars in engines but in beauty thereby being ignorant of fuel consumption and carbon emissions. Take these into consideration:
A) Americans drive big engines. 2.2, 2.5, 3.0, 3.5, 4.0, 4.5, 5.0 etc
B) American cars are 99% automatic drive. Higher energy required to transmit
C) Americans buy fuel in gallons and not litres as we have in Nigeria, and a gallon of fuel is equivalent to 4 litres of fuel.
Today it is no news that American cars are not fuel efficient, but Nigerians float them on the roads lavishing the little that our government import for domestic use. But let's retrospectively remember what cars we had on our roads in the late 80s and 90s. We had engines of 1.4, 1.6, 1.8, 2.0 and some 3.0s My point here is that since the advent of American cars in Nigeria, we have had more occasions of fuel scarcity.
Secondly, we are so dependent on fuel when diesel cars are available. My recent trip to Europe showed me that today Europeans drive more of diesel than fuel. This is because diesel apart from being more eco friendly consumes less than fuel. I also found out that Europeans drive mainly small cylinders of 1.2, 1.4 to 2.0 engines.
Our quest for American cars is a great mistake and Nigeria today is the biggest market for American used cars.
Automatic cars obviously are more cost accruing both in carburant and maintenance. But I ask, why is every Nigerian after automatic cars? The automatic car is in control of you and not you in control.
It would not be nice when government imports, for example, 2.5 million litres of fuel for us to use in a month and we consume it in 2 weeks.

I believe we think about this.
God bless Nigeria.