Fuel Subsidy: What the President knows but can’t bite the bullet and do something about
President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, the man whom, many people around him say would surely contest the 2015 presidential elections to claim the second term in office that he richly qualifies to do (and for which pseudo-political campaigns are being carried out on television and in the press by cronies and supporters), admitted recently that he knows a thing or two about this dreaded monster called fuel subsidy.
This admission of what is arguably the biggest insider information that has ever emanated from government is also the reason some very cheeky indulgees have stormed the square table today asking that someone be brought before them for a whipping with the infamous military era koboko (horsewhip)!
Do not laugh wherever you are reading this and don’t add your own cheeky interpretation of the facts by thinking it’s the very Oga at the top that the cheeky indulgees are asking to be subjected to this kind of treatment! Far be it for them to entertain such a thought!
Indulgees are not known to want to stretch their freedom that far and become disrespectful. As a matter of fact, should it become the case, they are likely to be one of the first groups to join, whenever it was decided, that the President be called Father of the Nation, the way that church leaders are so easily and frequently called Papa and Mama, not withstanding how very young they might be!
The person they are asking to be brought forward for the koboko treatment is the person who ever come up with this idiomatic expression: A problem shared is a problem half solved. Indulgees are screaming, like Chief Zebrudaya Okoro-igwe Nwogbo used to say in original TV soap, The Masquarade, “whoside?” And they are joining Zeeeebie (lovingly so called by his wife in the soap, Ovuleria) to shout “whoside” because they think that the person who came up with that idiom, did not reckon there would be a country called Nigeria and that this country was going to be filled with people who would have a natural disposition not to be bothered by information at their disposal, which they ought to do something meaningful with!
So, when Presdient Jonathan reveals what he knows about fuel subsidy, they are saying to the idiom, “A problem shared is a problem half solved, ‘whoside’ because nothing seems to have been done with that information. As a consequence, these cheeky indulgees are saying that the president might as well be talking to the marines because he doesn’t appear to be ready to apply what he knows about fuel subsidy to deal with the dangerous problem of fuel subsidy (and that’s deliberate, should you begin to think repetition stems from my laziness to invent expressions).
So, what did President Jonathan say exactly? Well, if you’d really like to know, let me, as chief indulgee, put context to this matter. Fuel subsidy is that economic crime against the nation that has been going on for many years now. It’s a crime that is being perpetuated by people who already have, those that people in the Marxism-Capitalism debate like to call the ‘haves’ (and here, you might well be talking about the ‘super haves’). The ‘have’s are creaming off a lot from the ‘have-nots’ because fuel subsidy is actually meant to ensure that the price of petrol is stable and that kept at a certain price so that everybody can afford it.
Unfortunately, it is not only that the price is not stable as you travel across the country, but the ‘have-nots’, because they are dispersed widely in remote countryside, hardly get to have petrol easily available where they are. It’s almost like double jeopardy for the hapless have-nots. And this subsidy, which is being stolen, is partly paid by them, money which should directly and productively benefit them. It was no surprise when the president offered the confidential information that 60 percent of fuel subsidy funds was being smuggled abroad!
What the President means in essence is this: “As president of this country, I have privileged intelligence that 60 percent of what my government pays as subsidy is smuggled out of our country.” Now, smuggling is an illegal act, isn’t it? If the president knows this, he needs to act on the information he has. Why is he not seen to be doing anything?
But, let hear everything that the president did actually say when he recently unveiled the national identity card in Abuja. Have a read: “If you take the issue of subsidy of transport; what we do is subsidising hydrocarbon, it does not go to the ordinary people. Government spends huge sums of money, hundreds of billions of naira every year in the budget, ask the National Assembly.
“Sometimes, it is controversial subsidising kerosene; yet, it is going very high in the market, subsidising the PMS and so on.
“We are thinking about how to subsidise the transportation system such as the person going to school, the person going to the market, the person moving from Lagos to Enugu or Lagos to Kano, and not paying subsidy 60 percent of which will be smuggled out of the country.
“And those who make the money will come and use that money to induce the people suffering to even riot against government.”
Can you imagine all the things the president knows about this subsidy fraud, that has sucked the economy for so long and for which he’s not having the bottle to do anything concrete about? In case you don’t know, in just seven years to 2013, Nigeria spent N4.9trn on fuel subsidy. Last year alone, N971bn was voted for subsidy in the budget. In 2011 Nigeria burnt N1.3trn (rising to N2.19trn if you add what arrears paid in 2012 for what was consumed in 2011).
This racket has produced fraudulent multi-millionaires and billionaires at the expense of the economy and many have-nots. Yet, the simple antidote route to this disaster, scrapping the nonsense called fuel subsidy, liberalise the downstream industry, is not being followed. When will the president do the right thing for citizens with respect to this subsidy fraud? Is it after the 2015 elections? We wait?
PHILLIP ISAKPA