Governors threaten NNPC over fuel subsidy
National Economic Council (NEC), comprising the 36 State Governors
in the country has threatened to take over the responsibility of
subsidising petroleum products in their states based on consumption
following the huge amount of money being spent by the NNPC as fuel
subsidy payment annually.
The Chairman of Governors’ Forum, Gov. Abdulazeez Yari of Zamfara
who stated this while responding to questions after the meeting of NEC
which was chaired by Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo at the presidential
villa, Abuja on Thursday, said the governors would next month (June)
take decision on whether to take responsibility for the subsidy in their
states or not.
He described as outrageous the N800billion being expended by the
NNPC as subsidy, saying that NEC must decide whether to allow NNPC to
continue with the payment or not.
“Our problem is the volume, the quantity of consumption which is not acceptable.
“Working with the governors so many decisions were taken but by
next month, we are going to adopt that position either for the
governors to take responsibility for the subsidy in their states based
on the consumption or we look at other ways.
“For instance, if you say we paid N800 billion subsidy, you
will ask who are we paying the subsidy to? And if you look at
infrastructure development and capital programme of the Federal
Government, it is about N1.1 trillion, almost 70 per cent of what you
are spending on developing the economy.
“If there is no infrastructure development then you cannot talk
about development of the economy. N800 billion is a huge amount that we
must look at it, who is benefiting from it.
“So we are coming up with a strategy, we are going to meet in
the month of May and June. By next meeting, we will definitely come up
with a position of the government at both level of volume of what is
being brought into the country and what the state and Federal Government
collaborate to check,’’ he said.
The governor revealed that the Minister of State for Industry,
Trade and Investment briefed the NEC on the establishment of the
Nigerian Industrial Policy and Competitiveness Advisory Council which
was approved by Federal Executive Council (FEC) in 2017.
“The Industrial Council recognises that there is need for
collaboration between the Federal Government (FG), State and Local
Government to drive the industrialisation agenda.
“The briefing today was to present the eight initiatives and
recommendations from the Industrial Council that requires State
Governments intervention,’’ he added.
Yari said the Advisory Council requested NEC to approve the
proposals to address the bottlenecks identified in order to drive the
Industrialisation agenda.
He, however, said that the Council while welcoming the prayers
resolved that the Nigeria Communication Commission should go and outline
its plans and communicate same to the State Governors in the next
meeting.
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