Lai Mohammed, minister of information, says the
“opportunistic” opposition is playing dirty politics with the new electricity
tariff and increase in petrol price.
Addressing a press conference on Monday in Abuja, Mohammed
said subsidising petrol is no longer feasible owing to the prevailing economic
conditions.
Mohammed said the federal government could no longer afford
petrol subsidy because the country’s foreign exchange earnings have fallen by
almost 60 percent.
He said petrol price in Nigeria remains the lowest in West Africa with N162/ litre, adding that Ghana, Benin Republic and Togo sell petrol at N322, N359 and N300 per litre respectively.
“The opportunistic opposition and their allies are playing
dirty politics with the issue of petrol pricing and electricity tariff. Please
note that these naysayers did not complain when the price adjustment led to
lower petrol prices on at least two occasions since March,” he said.
“Yet, the government has had to sustain expenditures,
especially on salaries and capital projects.
“One of such difficult decisions, which we took at the
beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March – when oil prices collapsed at the
height of the global lockdown – was the deregulation of the prices of PMS.
“As I said earlier, the benefit of lower prices at that time
was passed to consumers. Everyone welcomed the lower fuel price then. Again,
the effect of deregulation is that PMS prices will change with changes in
global oil prices.
“This means quite regrettably that as oil prices recover,
there will be some increases in PMS prices. This is what has happened now.”
The minister said the adjustment to the electricity tariff
is for the industry to be able to sustain itself.
“The truth of the matter is that due to the problems with
the largely-privatised electricity industry, the government has been supporting
the industry,” he said.
“To keep the industry going, the government has so far spent
almost 1.7 trillion naira, especially by way of supplementing tariffs
shortfalls.
“The government does not have the resources to continue
along this path. To borrow just to subsidize generation and distribution, which
are both privatized, will be grossly irresponsible.”
The minister said the government is not insensitive to the
economic difficulties of the citizens, adding that “we certainly will not
inflict hardship on our people.”
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com