In the wake of the removal of fuel subsidy in Nigeria, civil rights activist and the Head of the Directorate of Research, Strategy & Programmes of the coalition of civil society organisations, Act for Positive Transformation Initiatives, Kolawale Johnson, has stated that Nigeria cannot afford to continue paying the age-long subsidy.
President Bola Tinubu had, in his inaugural speech on May 29th, declared that the country can no longer sustain the payment of subsidy, and this development has triggered an uproar across the country as citizens complain about the astronomical hike in prices of transportation fare and other essential goods and services.
Despite the protests, the presidency has stated that there is no going back in the removal of fuel subsidy, stating the burden it causes the government. Speaking exclusively with Media Talk Africa about the matter, Mr. Kolawale argued that there would be no better time to remove the fuel subsidy than now.
He ascribed the continuous remittance of the subsidy to oil marketers to the failure of previous administrations, stating that “If we stop the subsidy, maybe the money that should have gone into it in the next three months will be used for palliatives. This is the level we are right now. We don’t even have the money to provide those palliatives unless we borrow again.”
Adding that “The reality across the world now is that you have to survive, and for you to survive, you need to take hard decisions,” he said “Even the palliatives and other things that needed to be put in place before the removal, we can’t have them now because we don’t have money.”
In conclusion, Mr. Kolawale asserted that if Obasanjo, Yar’Adua, Jonathan, and even Buhari had failed to deal with the subsidy, then we can say that it was the government’s failure that the subsidy persisted till this moment. Thus, the decision to remove it is a hard but necessary one and the government should take steps to alleviate the sufferings of the masses who are bound to be affected.
