Candidate of the Action Democratic Congress (ADC) in the last presidential election, Dumebi Kachikwu, has said that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu‘s administration failed to apply a structured approach to the removal of fuel subsidy.
OsunDaily News reported that Tinubu, while delivering his inauguration speech on May 29, 2023, declared that the ‘fuel subsidy’ is gone.
He stated that the proposed budget by his predecessor, Muhamadu Buhari, made no provision for fuel subsidy in the year’s budget starting from June.
Speaking on the latest suffering and lamentations by Nigerians following the incumbent President’s declaration on fuel subsidy, Kachikwu said on Monday that former President, Buhari, handed a banana peel to his successor, Tinubu.
According to him, Buhari did not want to take responsibility for the fuel subsidy a few days before leaving office; hence, pushed it to the incoming.
OsunDaily News reports that Kachikwu stated this on Monday while appearing as a guest on Channels Television’s Politics Today.
“Obviously, the President was handed a banana peel by the outgoing President, Buhari, who failed to provide for subsidy beyond June when he was leaving office. He obviously did not want to deal with that and he pushed on that responsibility to the incoming government.
“We also understand that the Nigerian economy is in tatters, the government doesn’t have the funding, and the NNPC is in the state of near comatose. They will crumble if they continue to fund subsidy; they are said to be owed over two trillion naira at the moment. President Tinubu just informed Nigerians of the situation he was meeting,” Kachikwu said.
Speaking further, Kachikwu asserted that Nigerians were aware that there was no provision for subsidy beyond June but that they did not expect that any government would want to deal with it the way the present government did, adding that they expected a structured approach to deal with it.
Commenting on the planned strike by the Organised Labour over the fuel subsidy removal, Kachikwu condemned the labour unions, saying that they knew that the government was going to remove subsidy and that all the presidential candidates had promised to do the same but never complained.
He called on the Federal Government to go after those abusing the subsidy system and also urged Tinubu to put immediate measures to cushion the impact of subsidy removal.
