Dangote has done three things in the last 72 hours that the Nigerian government could not do in 60 years.
He cut aviation fuel to N1,650 per litre, slashed diesel and aviation fuel prices at ex-depot level, and filed a lawsuit to stop NNPC and private marketers from importing fuel that his refinery is already producing in surplus.
Now the oil marketers are crying monopoly.
Let us be honest about what monopoly means in this context. For 60 years, a cartel of fuel importers held Nigeria hostage, collecting $10 billion annually in subsidy, keeping state refineries deliberately broken, and charging Nigerians premium prices for refined crude they sent abroad themselves.
Nobody called that a monopoly. Nobody filed a lawsuit about market stability when ordinary Nigerians queued for fuel in an oil producing country for decades.
One private refinery starts cutting prices, increasing supply, and going to court to enforce a law that already says imports are only permitted when local supply is insufficient, and suddenly the marketers have discovered the language of competition and consumer protection.
The law is clear. The Petroleum Industry Act only permits fuel imports when domestic supply cannot meet demand. Dangoteโs refinery is supplying over 90% of Nigeriaโs daily petrol consumption. The legal basis for those import licences does not exist. He is not asking for a favour. He is asking for the law to be applied.
The marketers built their business model on Nigeriaโs inability to refine its own oil. That inability has been solved by one man with private capital. Their business model is obsolete and their objection is not about market stability. It is about market access to a rent they no longer deserve.