Tag: tinubu

All Progressives Congress (APC) National Leader Asiwaju Bola Tinubu yesterday said the Federal Government’s removal of subsidy on petrol was necessary and inevitable.

He said a situation where bogus suppliers were paid huge sums for supplying nothing while long lines of queues remained was unsustainable.

Tinubu believes the subsidy regime led to petroleum products being smuggled to neighbouring countries while scarcity persisted.

The consequence, he said, was that as the price of petrol stayed fixed at a low level, investors were apprehensive about fixing the refineries or building others.

According to Tinubu, while the price of fuel was cheap on paper, there were hidden costs that made the subsidy regime an expensive and heavy yoke for the country.

“With dwindling revenue from oil due to the slump in global oil prices and a dwindling forex reserve, the country could no longer live in denial.

“President Muhammadu Buhari, after carefully weighing the options, decided to do what is right.

“In an act of courage, he removed the oil subsidy, thereby freeing the downstream component of this strategic sector of the economy from the distortions of price fixing,” Tinubu said.

The former Lagos State governor said the President’s decision constituted a major step toward removing the nightmare of fuel importation and its attendant hardships, especially to the foreign reserve condition.

The president’s decision to reallocate funds once earmarked for the fuel subsidy and commit those funds to other more socially productive services and undertakings was a difficult decision. It was also a necessary  one.

Politically, it would have been easy for the President to sit back and let the subsidy remain in place, yet in the art of governance, the easiest policy is rarely the best one.

As originally envisioned, the subsidy formed a basic part of the social contract between the people and their government. It was a benefit all were to enjoy. Yet, because past governments were not for and of the people, the true meaning and objective of the subsidy policy became lost. Over the years, the operation of the measure was distorted to where it no longer functioned for the benefit of the masses but for the undue enrichment of a small club of businessmen, some legitimate in their work, some not.

Instead of remaining a positive aspect of the social contract, the subsidy was transformed into an opaque haven of intrigue and malfeasance. It was turned into a shadowy process from which the unscrupulous extracted large sums of money without providing the services and products duly paid for. Fake businessmen became true billionaires over night as if by supernatural force. They paraded themselves as such. Meanwhile, the rest of the nation, the innocent people where left to face erratic supply and were made to groan in the misery of long fuel queues and the high costs and loss of time attendant to this situation.

To allow this unfairness to continue would have been a breach of the promise made by this government to the people. While we all have an emotional and sympathetic attachment to the ideals upon which the subsidy was founded. We all must recognize that the institution was hijacked years ago. Instead of a bonus to the masses, it became a factory of corruption enrichment. so imbued with trickery deceit and theft, it stopped serving the interests of the people. It became a weapon of profiteering. The machinery of the subsidy had become so polluted that it was no longer feasible to talk about reforming it. Either it had to cease or we would have to surrender to the corruption now inherent in it.

This administration entered office with a mandate of CHANGE. The government could not forever sit back and allow this dire inequity to continue less it forfeit the essence of its mandate.

We all want fuel at a cheaper price. under the subsidy, we got the right price but not the fuel. Meanwhile, some were getting rich on the common man’s predicament. They were laughing to the bank while the rest of Nigeria wanted in the petrol line. This is not the way to democratic development. It is a recipe for creating a class of economic predators that would feed off the people and in time gain such power and wealth that they would seek to buy and control if not own government as well.

President Buhari has with this decision put an abrupt and just end to this assault against our economy and political system. He has made a courageous and prudent decision. It is time to end the fuel subsidy and to begin to subsidise the true needs of the people.

To Mr. President, I say congratulations for having the courage to remove the subsidy.  The President has taken this tough decision in the interest of the present and future generations of Nigerians.

For some time, I have been a proponent of this action. I believed ending of subsidy was the only sure way to put to sleep the myriad demons that had invaded the subsidy process, sucking the blood of Nigeria, swallowing much of our needed money.

The rentiers will no longer be able to make free money at our common expense. They will no longer be laughing to the bank while you languish in endless fuel queues. Nigeria has taken the historic step needed to create a competitive environment that that will eliminate smuggling, provide incentives for private refineries and attract foreign investments in the downstream sector and create employment.

  Instead of just shipping off the oil and having the more expensive finished products sent back to us, Nigeria will move closer to realising its potential to become the plastic center of the continent by manufacturing these by products. Nothing can stop Nigeria from being the net exporter of fertiliser from the bye products of the oil industry.

I am hopeful but also realistic about this measure. I am also mindful of the situation of our people. this change will mean higher fuel costs in generally. I would be lying if I said this will cause no pain or dislocation. However, it will rational supply and end the hidden buy substantial costs associated with long waits and delays for fuel. The days and hours of waiting for fuel will be a thing of the past.

In a perfect setting, I wish we could have sanitised the subsidy regime and thus continue it. However, I believe that President Buhari correctly understood that there were to many malefactors and flaws in system for that hell to be turned into heaven. Better that we remove it. But I believe he is removing it not for the austere purpose of saving money but for the nobler purpose of putting those same funds to fairer, more equitable use in order that government might better serve those of us who are truly in utmost need.

Now that the subsidy is being phased-out, we should simultaneously phase in social programmes benefiting the poorest, most vulnerable among us. Programmes such as transportation grants, school feeding, improved basic medical care and coverage for the poor, and potable water projects are profound social objectives that can be funded with the funds that were once going to rentiers and speculators. This way we can use government funds to ensure that fruits  go to the hungry, not the already well fed.

Thus, I ask everyone to take a step back to coolly and objectively assess what has been decided. We must not make the mistake of allowing our political and sympathetic attachment to the subsidy blind us to the hard fact that the purpose and benefits of the subsidy had long ago been taken from the common man to reside in the purse of an elite few. We cannot persist in this imbalance and think it will help us to development.

 Instead, it is better to end the subsidy and use the funds to establish well-targeted anti-poverty programs that actually assist the people in need. true, this measure will increase fuel cost in the immediate term. here, government must be vigilant to ensure market forces are allowed to work and to bring about a fair balance between supply, demand and longer-term price. Collusion and manipulation of the market cannot be allowed.

 If government sets the system fairly, it will ensure better supply and with it economic certainty. Over the longer term, it will boost investment that can spur employment in this and related sectors.  Perhaps more importantly, it will liberate money that this government may now use to lower the social costs of living for our brothers and sisters who really need the help.

While this may not be perfect, it is a much better deal than the one the subsidy offered us.

National leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has urged the Federal Government to pay more attention to the LAKAJI corridor to ease trade. This, he said would be possible through the provision of basic infrastructure that will ease production and transportation of agricultural produce.

Tunubu, who spoke at an interactive session in the ongoing Katsina State Economic and Investment Summit, said LAKAJI is an acronym for Lagos–Kano-Jibia corridor.

Represented by a former Lagos State Commissioner of Finance and Executive Director at First Bank, Mr. Tokunbo Abiru, Tinubu said a strategic approach must be adopted where the upper north has the capacity for agricultural production that should be based on strength.

He maintained that the LAKAJI corridor, with 10 states on its routes, needs concerted efforts based on individual strength, where those who have the capacity to produce can complement storage capacity to add value to the system, especially in the case of the movement of goods to Lagos where the consumption is high.

The former governor expressed concern over challenges confronting the LAKAJI corridor, saying that storage and other production processes to the end consumers calls for improvement.

He urged Nigerians to embrace the project by encouraging domestic and regional facilitation of trade, which requires bringing in innovation technology to boost capacity and encourage peasant farmers on the new technology.

National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has described the late Oba of Benin, His Royal Majesty (HRM), Omo n’Oba n’Edo Uku Akpolopkolo Erediauwa, as a sterling example of royalty.

In a tribute by his media office, Tinubu condoled with the Benin Traditional Council, the governor of Edo State and the entire people of the renowned Benin Kingdom over the passing of the monarch.

The former Lagos State governor described the departure of the revered Oba of Benin as a great loss coming at a time when his ethics, wisdom and political astuteness would be of great service serve to building a virile and durable Nigeria.

He said: “The Oba of Benin was a sterling example of royalty by virtue of both the position he held and by the excellent personality of this great man.

“The most enduring kingdoms of all kingdoms with a history rooted in time and achievement.

“The kingdom has brought great honor to Nigeria and I believe it will continue to even after his demise.

“With his passing away, we must strive to live by his legacy of honesty, justice, fairness and respect for tradition and culture.

“He imbued the throne with the steadfast dignity and moral force that bestowed honor and .glory of his forbears.”

The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Lagos State has described “as silly rants” the call by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for the Code of Conduct Tribunal to re-open the case against the APC National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.

In a statement in Lagos by its Publicity Secretary, Joe Igbokwe, the party blasted thePDP as a spent gathering of losers who face serious indictment for their roles in the corruption that marked its exit in the country.

“That the PDP failed woefully is not news but that its leaders have been fingered in high profile cases of stealing and looting such that some of them have fled into ignominious exile is news.

“That it is building yet another salacious demand for the reopening of a political hatchet case it prosecuted against Tinubu shows that Lagos PDP seriously needs to overcome the debilitating loss it has continually suffered in Lagos and the calamity that befell it at the national level.

“We advise Lagos PDP to not only quit making silly and senseless demands but concern itself with explaining the roles its leaders played in the ensuing corruption scandals that formed the primary business of the PDP in power.

“We urge Lagos PDP to stop its silly acts of distraction as the party faces extinction in the years ahead.”