Police in Nkhotakota are keeping in custody five people for alleged illegal storage and selling of petrol in the district.

The district’s Police station’s publicist Paul Malimwe says the five were arrested at the district headquarters in an exercise conducted by the law enforcers in conjunction with the Malawi Energy Regulatory Authority (MERA).

He said 135 litres of petrol have since been seized from the suspects.

This comes at a time most filling stations in the district have run out of petrol, prompting some vendors to sell it at as high as 4, 000 Kwacha per litre, on the black market.

Malimwe says the exercise was conducted after observing that some vendors were hoarding the commodity to sell at a higher price than the recommended one.

-Zodiak-