When petrol prices go to double N65 per liter in 2012.....

Our "leaders" have finally put the nail in the coffin for the Nigerian masses. As from 2012, petrol will no longer be at N65 per liter. It will be double that, all in the name of funding capital projects and minimum wage.


In a country that exports oil at an average of over two million barrels of oil per day, a non-Nigerian would think that Nigeria would have a lot of refineries to refine this same oil into petroleum products and sell at really low prices to Nigerians. But that is not the case. It seems only exporters of oil, importers of petrol and the "looters" in government enjoy this so called "black gold" as the rest of us Nigerians have not seen any dividends of it. The government's reason for subsidising petrol was because the importers have been bringing into the country petrol at nearly N135 per litre and because it would be hard for Nigerian people to pay that type of money for petrol. And so the importers were paid N50 for each litre by the government while we pay the rest. This subsidy has cost the government about N1.3 trillion which they say should have been used for capital projects to develop Nigeria.


There are many flaws, concerning this latest move:

• Nigerians have not been briefed about any detailed plan on how our government intends to use this extra money to the benefit of our country. All we hear are talks about capital projects which are vague and minimum wage. Our main fear is that most of the money would be misappropriated and end up in private pockets.
• This is a terrible time to remove these subsidies especially as we do not have any working refineries on ground yet to help ease the suffering of people who would have to pay nearly N150 per litre. Most people are unemployed or underpaid. We have barrage of youths on the streets who are idle and looking for any little change in environment to be incensed and go on a destructive spree.
• Importers would be kings of the land as they would dictate the prices of petrol as they please. They could also create artificial scarcity which would further increase the prices and suffering of people. 
• People with cars or okada who were struggling to pay for fuel at N65 per liter would result to trekking to their destinations. Many people would also be without power for most of the time as using generator sets would be a luxury. Prices of everything would go up because petrol is used for nearly every thing in Nigeria. Food prices would be hiked to defray transportation costs and costs of using generator sets, which is an absolute necessity would make the cost running businesses shoot up.
• Minimum wage which was set at N18,000 and fought for many months would amount to nothing as inflation would make it useless to anybody.

Removing these subsidies is not a bad idea at all. But seeming as we do not trust our "leaders" to ever do the right thing at the right time, the government will need to go back to the drawing board and look at it again because it going to be in the interest of nobody but those in power that control our resources.


If this plan goes through, then it is clear that President Goodluck Jonathan seems to have no regard for the plight of the Nigerian people. 


Life is already hard enough for most Nigerians Mr. President. Please do not bring this country down to her knees.


(I hope he at least tries to read this)


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