Editorial Opinion
President Tinubu, Fuel Subsidy Removal & A Staccato Of Policies
For the larger part of his administration, President Muhammadu Buhari had been doing cash transfers to the poor using the social register.
President Tinubu should ask himself, “How many ‘poor of the poor Nigerians’ were brought out of poverty, when the NBS, according to its statistics, say over 133 million Nigerians live in poverty?”
Tinubu can’t continue to implement the same policies of his predecessor and expect different results. Never!
About two months into his administration, it has been a season of policy summersaults in a staccato fashion that has defied commonsense and left many Nigerians bruised, battered and left in a state of economic confusion of hopelessness.
In a period like these, nobody has mentioned the leading characters who paraded the corridors of Aso Rock, the presidency, as economic advisers to former president Buhari!
One particular name comes to my mind – Bismarck Rewane. Bismarck is a foremost, bourgeoise, unrepentant economist, that led the call to remove fuel subsidy. Strangely, and for unfathomable reasons, Bismarck has gone into hiding. He has suddenly become deaf to the cries of pain from Nigerians in the implementation of his so-called advise on the removal of fuel subsidy. Bismarck should come out of hiding to bury the corpse of his ‘remove fuel subsidy advise’ legs that are still exposed. He should not hide but come out to proffer solutions on how to manage the monstrous ‘genie’ that he created with his aggressive advise on fuel subsidy removal!
While Nigerians are still yet to recover from the pains of subsidy removal, Federal Government ‘Unity Schools’ and other public universities hiked their fees.
Without talking about hyper-inflation and the exorbitant cost of food prices, Nigerian masses have now been bounded to the ‘philistines’ in a situation of ‘Every man for himself, God for all of us’. And, so what does the future hold for Nigerian parents and school children when economic and earning capacities of parents are daily being stretched and strangulated by the harsh effects of fuel subsidy removal?
Like it or not, the removal of fuel subsidy will turn the Nigerian economy into a proverbial ‘dog eat dog’ economic society. This is a society that will have everyone waiting for an opportunity to avenge the price increase of every service or commodity from others.
As our elders say, “We can predict the beginning of a war but we cannot predict the consequences and the end of the war.” Nigerians await the future with a bated breathe of uncertainty albeit the humongous natural resources that God has blessed the nation with, without any comparative advantage on her people.
Biblically, at a point, during the plagues of Egypt, Pharaoh softened his heart and harkened to the cries of the children of Israel. Tinubu, like moses, you are a product of the ghetto, not a silver spoon product, don’t abandon your folks.
President Tinubu, you hold the knife and yam of Nigeria on behalf of Nigerians, an opportunity that Providence has thrust upon your shoulders. I call upon you to sleep and turn on all sides of your body, north, south, east and west, with just one thought on your mind, the thought of the pains of ordinary Nigerians. Go back and review the removal of fuel subsidy. Nigeria is a successful father farmer, with his barns overflowing with food, yet his children are starving. This should not happen.
May God bless Nigeria.