President Muhammadu Buhari is not in support of petrol subsidy removal because of the negative impact it would have on Nigeria. This is according to Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipre Sylva.
In an interview with Channels TV, in which he made this known, the minister said the President is not in support of the petrol subsidy removal even though stakeholders in the public administration are aggressively pushing for it.
Sylva made this known on the backdrop of the recommendation by the National Executive Council (NEC) that petrol should sell N302 per litre, from between N162 and N165 per litre.
“The recommendation has since been reconsidered and dropped by the committee. According to the new report, the committee recommended full deregulation of PMS prices by February 2022 — raising the price by about N130/140 per litre.”
“It also recommended that all retailers should post PMS prices at all times on a designated website and smartphone app — and they are expected to post price changes no earlier than within 15 minutes of the price change.
“With the recommendations, the committee added that the federal government would save N250 billion per month on petrol subsidy removal.
“At current rates, the PMS subsidy is reducing transfers into the federation by about NGN 250 billion per month, and could, if PMS subsidies are not eliminated, result in deductions of NGN 3 trillion in 2022.
“The large-scale time-limited (6-months) cash transfer proposed as a way of transferring the subsidy “directly to the people” would cost N600 billion but would by paving the way for the elimination of PMS subsidies, enable the federation to recover N3 trillion in revenues that would otherwise go to PMS subsidies.
“If PMS subsidies are eliminated by February 2022, N250 billion in deductions would have been incurred, but the remaining N195 billion in anticipated PMS subsidy deductions could be redirected towards FGN funding of the cash-transfer programme,” the recommendation report from NEC had read.
Following the recommendation, there were fears from members of the public, and stakeholders, including former Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar (retd.), who expressed an opinion that should petrol subsidy be removed, it may lead to anarchy.
