By Yemi Adamolekun
 |
Diezani
Alison-Madueke
|
A year ago, Nigerians received a nasty
New Year’s gift via a press release from the Petroleum Products Pricing
Regulatory Agency that subsidy on Premium Motor Spirit would seize after
January 1.
Nigerian citizens as well as most
government officials, including the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria and
the Coordinating Minister of the Economy and Minister of Finance were, as we
were told, caught by surprise. Though there had been some discussions about
removing the subsidy with the 2012 budget around April 2012, there were still
ongoing consultations with various stakeholder-groups and the first of a series
of town hall meetings had just held a few weeks before the President made the
announcement in his nationwide address. Interestingly, the Minister of Finance,
Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had tentatively agreed to a town hall meeting
scheduled for January 22, 2012, to be hosted by Enough-is-Enough Nigeria, to
engage young people on the issue.
Expectedly, Nigerians reacted swiftly
with the first wave of protests starting on Monday, January 2, 2012, and this
continued across the country under the banner of OccupyNigeria. The general
strike which was called by the Nigeria Labour Congress started on Monday,
January 9 through Friday, January 13, saw Nigerians come out en masse across
the country in Kano (including women for the first time in history), Abuja,
Akure, Lagos, Ibadan, and Kaduna to name a few. Sadly, lives were lost during
the protests and no culpable government agent has yet been prosecuted. Labour
hastily called off the strike on Sunday, January 15 following discussions with
government officials but the government used military forces to forestall any
other citizen-led action.
While the removal of the subsidy was
the trigger, most Nigerians were clear that their concerns were on the cost of
governance, and the waste and corruption in government, which were the crux of
the lame excuses given to justify the removal. Why should the government not do
anything about cleaning up its act yet continue to inflict sufferings on
Nigerians at various levels? In a country that provides no social services and
the average citizen provides all basic utilities — water, electricity, and
security, the government cannot continue to rob us on all sides!
In her two appearances before the
Senate joint committees on Appropriation, Finance and Petroleum Resources
(Downstream) for the public hearing on “The Operations of the Fuel Subsidy
Scheme in Nigeria, the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke,
presented the Federal Government’s position as follows:
“The fuel subsidy structure is inefficient,
costing us N600bn ($3.75bn) in 2010 and N1.3 trillion ($8.125bn) from January –
October 2011. The Federal Government cannot continue to pay as it’s
unsustainable. By removing the subsidy, the savings will be used to provide
critical infrastructure and services. Currently, only a small percentage of
Nigerians (the marketers, middle and Upper-class Nigerians) benefit. When
removed, more Nigerians will benefit.”
In the aftermath of the January
protests, four committees were set up by the Minister of Petroleum Resources;
the President set up a technical committee; the Senate and the House of
Representatives conducted their own investigations. While each report has been
shrouded in controversy, the undisputed fact is that the regime is corrupt and
inefficient with guilty parties in the public and private sectors. The total
bill for 2011 was now N2.09tn ($13.4bn) and 2012 approximately N1.05tn
($6.8bn).
We protested last year against
government waste and corruption, yet in a lot of ways, things have only got
worse: a) there’s now fuel scarcity and most Nigerians don’t buy PMS at N97 per
litre. Most NNPC retail stations don’t even sell; b) large sums of money
continue to turn up missing; c) no one has yet to be prosecuted for the many
cases of fraud unravelled by the probes; d) the 2013 budget proposals show no
lessons learnt from the issues raised in 2012 – duplication across agencies and
line items that can’t be supported; and e) impunity at all levels of government
to name a few. On the flip side, Nigerians became more aware and it showed that
when pushed to the wall, Nigerians will react.
In the sector itself, there are lots of
unresolved issues:
•No one knows the exact amount the NNPC
makes or the exact amount of fuel consumed per day in Nigeria, so figures
remain estimates.
•Why does the NNPC still get 445,000
barrels of crude a day that it can’t refine?
•A lot of money is being spent to push
a Petroleum Industry Bill that both local and foreign operators agree is
detrimental to the sector.
•Our refineries continue to operate at
22% capacity while billions are earmarked for upgrades and Turnaround
Maintenance. In 2011, the Minister of Petroleum Resources said contracts had
been signed with the original builders to revamp the refineries. One year
later, no work has been done on any of them and upgrades are yet again in the
2013 budget.
The Federal Government has played fast
and loose with terms. In certain contexts, it talks about “deregulation”; in
others, “fuel subsidy removal”. The simple truth is if the sector is
deregulated, the price of PMS will stabilise amidst competing forces. We were
clear about this last year, but that was not the time to have a discussion
about a deregulation plan. Our demand was clear — return to N65 and then
present a deregulation plan that would, by default, include the removal of
subsidy. Removal of subsidy is one element of the deregulation process and
certainly not the first step.
One year later, there is no such plan
to deregulate the sector. When we got serious about fixing power, a road map
was created that provided a step-by-step process to privatise the power sector.
While the road map hasn’t been implemented flawlessly, we continue to stumble
through with improvements in certain areas.
Late last year, a Niger Delta elder
statesman said the oil producing states had received over N7tn ($45bn) in 13
years with nothing to show for it. In our 50 years since independence, it’s
estimated that $400bn of oil revenue has been stolen or misspent. If we are
really serious about accelerating growth in other areas of the economy and
taking advantage of our youth bulge, it would do us well to get serious about
deregulating this sector so that states can stop coming cap in hand every month
to Abuja for their share of the national cake.
It’ll force states to get more creative
about creating wealth and reorient public servants about the true meaning of
‘service’ that is not dependent on endless access to cash.
Fuel scarcity and increased fuel prices
— we hope the Federal Government does not take the easy route and push
Nigerians to the wall yet again.
Deregulate this sector already!
•Ms. Adamolekun is the National
Coordinator of Enough-is-Enough, Nigeria
No comments:
Post a Comment