Fuel Subsidy Removal: Tinubu Will Follow Through The Course Charted By Buhari — Keyamo

EKO HOT BLOG reports that the All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council has announced that the incoming administration of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu will follow through with President Muhammadu Buhari’s plan to remove fuel subsidies in Nigeria.

However, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has vowed to resist the plan, insisting that the refineries must be functional before the subsidy can be tampered with.

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The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited recently revealed that the country was spending over N400 billion monthly on petroleum subsidy, which it argued is largely unsustainable.

Speaking to The PUNCH, the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, revealed that the president-elect will decide when the fuel subsidy will be removed.

Keyamo, who is the Chief Spokesperson of the Tinubu-Shettima campaign, cautioned that the former Lagos governor should be left alone to decide on the date of his choice to execute it.

“It is one of the policies by which we campaigned. I cannot sit here and tell you when exactly it will be done. But the removal of subsidies is something that the president-elect pledged to do. Not only him. Virtually all the leading presidential candidates took the same position,” Keyamo said.

He further explained that the Federal Government targeted June to end subsidy because the budget only provided for subsidy up to June, but the new government will decide when it wants to.

“Of course, you know that when a new government takes over, the country is at its beck and call. Yes, I agree that government is a continuum. But all policies are not a continuum,” he added.

Keyami, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, revealed that Tinubu’s administration would carry out plans to cushion the impact of removing the subsidy. “I can assure you that the president-elect being who he is, will not do that without corresponding palliative (measures) to the masses. I can tell you that confidently,” he said.

It remains to be seen how the proposed removal of the fuel subsidy will affect Nigerians, who have been grappling with high fuel prices for years.

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The NLC has insisted that the refineries must be functional before the subsidy can be removed, while the APC campaign council maintains that the subsidy removal will go ahead as planned.