Nigerian Governors’ Forum Supports Subsidy Removal, Commends Labour For Calling Off Strike

The Nigerian Governors’ Forum has restated calls for removal of subsidy and the deregulation of the downstream sector, saying the existence of the subsidy regime was unsustainable.

The forum, in a statement on Wednesday signed by its Head of Media and Public Affairs, Mr Abdulrazaque Bello-Barkindo, said the governors’ position is coming after a meeting with the leadership of the Nigerian Labour Congress, NLC, following threat by the Union to embark on strike against subsidy removal.

Ekiti State governor, Mr Kayode Fayemi, led the NGF team comprising Mr Simon Bako Lalong of Plateau State and Chairman of the Northern Governors Forum and Mr Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State, Comrade Ayuba Waba and the TUC President, Mr Quadri Olaleye, represented the organised labour.

Delivering his opening remarks at the meeting, Fayemi argued that the nation’s economy “is at the precipice and that it has become necessary for the two groups to carefully verify all of NNPC’s estimates to ensure that whatever action is taken on subsidy, it would be the people that get direct benefits and not a few wealthy individuals and their cronies in the country.”

Fayemi noted that subsidy removal has remained an on-gong conversation not just among governors but the country at large and emphasised that governors cannot but be part of the solution providers in the onerous task that is confronting the nation.

The Ekiti State governor further stated that “there are raging questions of accountability associated with subsidy removal in the country and observed that the NGF and the NLC can jointly work together to proffer solutions that heal the economy and provide succour to the Nigerian people.”

He further stressed that governors cannot ignore the economics of petroleum, arguing that all the countries surrounding Nigeria including Niger, Mali, Cameroun and Ghana have their fuel pump price at the equivalent of a US dollar, adding that “Nigeria has a pump price that is far less than a dollar and is uncomfortable with the removal of subsidy until the challenge of what the NNPC is telling the country is confronted frontally.

“We need a partnership with the NLC to confront the challenges of what the NNPC is about,” he said, adding that, “We can only move forward if the NLC engages all those who are knowledgeable in the field like PENGASSAN to conduct a thorough research into the sector before any further action is taken on subsidy,” Fayemi declared.

He also pointed out that “only about eight states are benefitting directly from the subsidy while all the others have to contend with the situation on their own.”

The governor insisted that the partnership with the NLC must confront the perennial issue of palliatives for the common man towards cushioning the effects of subsidy removal on the citizenry stating that “not tackling the problem now is tantamount to postponing the evil day.

“Finding succour for the ordinary Nigerian at this time is absolutely imperative and necessary now more than ever,” the NGF Chairman emphasised.

Also speaking, Obaseki, warned that “we have a choice of continuing to behave like Father Christmas (Santa Claus) or take concrete actions on a problem that is permanently with us rather than throwing away N3 trillion on subsidy.”

Governor Obaseki suggested that the nation can, in the interim, increase productivity to reduce imports and create jobs.

He also emphasised that “the country would do well to revamp the power sector, which is virtually comatose because without power, we will continue to throw millions of our people into unemployment and ultimately, poverty.”

On his part, Lalong recalled that the NGF had spent three years on fuel subsidy matter because the country cannot continue with subsidy on petroleum products.

He stated that the country must find options and create opportunities that address the hardship that stares Nigerians in the face.

Lalong added hat the painstaking work that led to the solutions that the NGF was highlighting took a year to script together and warned therefore that the fact that “we are sitting here with Labour to resolve this contending issue does not mean that as we leave the table we should go to sleep.”

Instead, he advised the teams from the two groups to “immediately set out to work to find the light at the end of the tunnel.”

Both Comrade Ayuba Waba and the TUC president stressed their lack of appreciation of the trust deficit that characterised previous negotiations and wondered why the subsidy issue had always been shrouded in lack of transparency on the part of government.

The unionists argued that the conflicting figures that always came from the managers of the petroleum sector had always tended towards inefficiency which have remained, to the people and to Labour, completely objectionable