Hard times await residents of Kwara state as Taxi owners and drivers as Wednesday withdrew their services from major roads in Ilorin and other adjoining towns and villages over the ongoing fuel scarcity facing all the states of the federation.

The ploy was to increase the taxi fare across the state since the increased fuel price has refused to return to the official price while motor parts and services have all attracted sharp increase since the fuel crisis started.

Vanguard reliably gathered that the development was due to the higher increase in the sale of petrol to them at both the federal owned Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) mega fuel stations and Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria(IPMAN) filling stations in the state.

Following this development, most of the workers in both state and public service and residents of the state who came out early enough to join taxi to their different places of duties were disappointed due to the non availability of taxi on the roads to convey them.

The development however led the people to make use of Okada riders who also charged higher prices depending on the areas of their destination.

As at press time,Vanguard gathered that, petrol was being sold between N190 per liter and N200 per liter in most of the fuel stations across the state,while everything has attracted sharp increase as a result of the fuel price.