Popular human rights lawyer and activist, Femi Falana (SAN) has lampooned President Muhammadu Buhari for the recent increase in the price of fuel, describing the move as insensitive, immoral and illegal.
Speaking via a statement issued on Thursday, May 12, 2016, Falana said the increment was not in line with the pre-election promises of Buhari and the All Progressives Congress (APC) to remove subsidy without inflicting hardship on the masses.
While describing the move as illegal, Falana asserted that government lacks statutory power to set a new fuel price regime because the body empowered to take such decision, like the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) is yet to be constituted by the government, adding that the “unilateral decision of the Executive Secretary of the body to fix the pump price at N145 per litre is ultra vires and illegal in every material particular”.
He went on by saying: “In view of the illegality, insensitivity and immorality of the price increase the federal government should cancel it, revert to the status quo and consult widely with all relevant stakeholders in the society.”
Falana said the increment which was coming after the Directorate of Petroleum Resources (DPR) recently invited fresh bids for the setting up modular refineries, which resulted to licensing of 22 modular refineries “with combined capacities to refine 1.429 million barrels of crude oil per day was needless, adding that if the policy is genuinely pursued the construction of the refineries ought to be completed within the 9-12 months”.
“If such refineries are established in the country the importation of fuel and the fraud associated with it will stop. In the interim, instead of importing oil from Europe and the United States the NNPC should refine crude oil for domestic consumption in neighbouring countries which have functional refineries. After all, Nigeria refines 60,000 barrels of crude oil per day in Cote d’ivoire which is not an oil producing nation.”
“If subsidy had been removed over a month ago and the country has been saving $2 billion (from fuel importation and subsidy removal) while the refineries are now working at full capacity Dr. Kachukwu should tell Nigerians the justification for the new removal of fuel subsidy announced by him yesterday. “The cost elements that make up the N145 are provocative. If the total landing cost of a litre and other charges are fixed at N138 what is the basis of fixing the price at N145?
“For goodness sake, why should motorists be made to pay NPA/NIMASA charges, within and without storage/ bridging charges etc?”
