Lucky Obukohwo, Reporting
The 2023 Presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, has said that there was nothing wrong with the petroleum subsidy removal but the way and manner it was removed by President Bola Tinubu, that was what was bad.
The former Anambra State governor said he would have also removed the subsidy and floated the naira if he was elected president.
He clarified that, unlike the incumbent President, Bola Tinubu, his approach would have been different. According to him, he would have implemented the policies in a “gradual and organised” manner as against the haphazard method of the incumbent administration.
Recall that the President, during his inauguration on May 29, 2023, at Eagle Square, Abuja, announced the removal of the subsidy on petroleum, otherwise known as petrol.
His controversial “Subsidy is gone” statement immediately spiked the pump price of petrol from N190 to N500.
The price soared to over N1,000 and later dropped to about N880 in Lagos and higher in other states.
The Tinubu-led administration also floated the nation’s currency, a situation which saw the value of the local currency determined by market forces.
But over two years after President Tinubu’s “Subsidy is gone” pronouncement, Obi has questioned the whereabouts of the funds saved from the policy, noting that the gains should have been invested in “critical infrastructure.”
He lamented that critical areas of development have not witnessed any significant improvement since the removal of the subsidy.
He added that he would have negotiated with operators on a fair pricing template for the product.
“I have consistently maintained that I would have removed the fuel subsidy. If you go to my manifesto, it is there and the steps I would have taken in an organised manner.
“There is nothing wrong with the removal of fuel subsidy. What is wrong is the haphazard way in which it was announced and implemented.
“Since we were told that we removed it because we don’t want to borrow, and that the funds will allow for investments in critical infrastructure. Billions saved. Where is it? Where is it invested in critical areas of development?
“Everybody knows critical areas of development — education, health, and pulling people out of poverty. Have any of these three improved?
“No. There is nothing wrong in floating and devaluing your currency. You do this when you have productivity. In all of this, I would have done the same thing in an organised manner.”
He added that he would have ramped up the country’s production capacity in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors before floating the currency.
Weighing in on the floating of the naira, he said: “There’s nothing wrong with floating your currency. There’s nothing wrong with even devaluing your currency. But you do this when you have productivity.
“What devaluation or floating does is that your currency becomes, in terms of value, low. You attract investment. Your products become more marketable.
“But where we are unproductive, you have nothing to sell. So it’s a double whammy. So in all this, I would have done the same thing in an organised manner.”