Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) in the country have dismissed allegations that fuel shortage in the country is due to debts owed them by government.

Represented by their Chief Executive Officer, the oil companies rather attributed the shortage to delay in delivery.

“We missed the vessel,” according to Nana Kwaku Duah, CEO for the OMCs on Wednesday in an exclusive interview with TV3.

He said the companies were expecting over 30,000 tonnes capacity of fuel but there was a delay. “In fact, we expect it to normalize by Friday,” he assured.

Nana Duah was worried people assume the oil marketing companies deliberately hoard the products to await fortnight reviews by the National Petroleum Authority (NPA).

“There are about over 2,500 outlets in this country and we don’t have electronic devices to determine what somebody has, but we work on the feedback mechanism,” he explained; adding that “where there is no fuel in certain stations, it feeds into the OMC system and we will get to know.”

Nana Duah advised that Ghanaians learn to pay the right price of fuel in order to avoid situations of unexpected shortage.

He said the government cannot subsidize fuel products since that may worsen the situation in the event that it fails to stand the subsidies.

“The risk that we face…is that if we do that the government has to subsidize the fuel and if government is not able to find the money, there will be fuel shortage.

“We need to learn to pay the right price of fuel. If we don’t, then we will have serious repercussions.”