Nigerian state television says the military government has ordered an additional fifty shiploads of petroleum to try to reduce the persisitent scarcity of fuel.

The television quoted the Lagos state governor, Colonel Mohamed Marwa, as saying that one hundred million litres of extra fuel will be made available over the next week to ease the situation in Lagos.

Correspondents say that Nigeria -- despite being Africa's biggest oil producer -- has been forced to rely on fuel imports in recent years due to poor maintainance of the state-owned refineries.

The situation has been further exacerbated by last week's pipeline fire near Warri that killed over seven hundred people scavenging for petrol at the broken pipeline.