By Idang Alibi
A few days ago, the African Independent Television brought home to viewers a candle-lit event organised to mark the anniversary of the anti-fuel subsidy removal protest which paralysed the country for many days early in January last year and whose deleterious effect on our economy is yet to be fully accounted for; for the harm it did is so monumental that it cannot ever be fully or accurately quantified. The event was held by some “activists” who consider themselves heroes of that event that I, and no doubt, many other patriots, regard as a national tragedy of immense proportion. It was obviously their own way of celebrating what they apparently consider the triumph of the forces of “progress” and “patriotism” over the forces of “oppression” and “retrogression”. And if that is their reading of the war fought on the streets of many Nigerian cities last year, my question is: are they really correct?
Before I answer that question let me say that it is not entirely surprising that of all the nation’s TV networks, it was only the AIT that gave elaborate treatment to that news event. This is consistent with the AIT because during the protest last year, that station threw caution, circumspection, professionalism and responsibility to the winds and opened its airwaves to just any Nigerian or foreigner who had something evil to say against the subsidy removal to use the foulest of terms to say it. Market women, vulcanisers and all manner of persons who did not understand the issues involved, had their say. It looked like the station did not see any single person in this nation of 160 million people who had something even tangentially positive to say about the government move. The way the AIT carried on in its crusading zeal against fuel subsidy removal looked like the station’s owner had a personal grouse against the government and was desperately looking for an opportunity to draw blood and that it was not love for the nation that was the motivating factor for the crusade.
Whatever may have been the motivation for AIT’s performance on this issue last year, it is surprising that given what we have seen of the “victory” of the protest against full removal of subsidy, anyone is still celebrating that so called victory today. Since Nigerians voted on the streets that they were against full removal of subsidy on petrol, this country spent last year and will again spend for this year about a quarter of its annual budget on subsidy. To me and many other reasonable Nigerians, this is gross irresponsibility on the part of all adult Nigerians who have reached the age of accountability and wisdom. Future generation will curse us for our unwisdom and I want to be exempted from such which is why I have summoned courage to publicly voice out my stand on this vexing issue.
I know that many of my readers will feel extremely disappointed by this submission of mine here but my responsibility as a writer is not to say what will please my readers or win me mew readership. I owe it as a duty to say the truth I know on every issue for the betterment of my country. Woolly sentiments to sound progressive or revolutionary would be a great disservice to Mother Nigeria. We all know that since the pegging of petrol price at 97 Naira per litre, it is only in some parts of Abuja and some parts of Lagos that that commodity is purchased at that price. In many places, petrol sells for as high as 200 Naira a litre and it times of great scarcity it goes for even much higher. Yet, no one seems prepared to heed the argument by government officials that fuel subsidy actually benefits the marketers and not the ordinary Nigerian.
Some of us, including, quite unfortunately, some notable commentators, have simply made up their mind that they are ideologically opposed to fuel subsidy removal and that they stand ready to oppose it any day any time whatever bad effect such stance may bring upon the country. Some have also adopted the stance of living in denial, arguing that there is nothing like fuel subsidy at all; that it is actually one of the ways the governing elite have chosen to steal the country’s money. Some, even in the National Assembly, maintain this argument yet they it is, who appropriate that one quarter of government spending for fuel subsidy! If there is actually no fuel subsidy, why make provision for it in the national budget?
Today, President Goodluck Jonathan is too scared to even think of broaching the idea of full fuel subsidy removal even when he is severely pained by the way the non removal is needlessly bleeding our country to near death. The matter, my dear compatriots, does not have to do with our individual feelings about President Jonathan. It has everything to do with the destiny of our country. How reasonable is it that we spend one quarter of our annual budget to sustain expenditure that we can do without? Why must we come to a stand that since God has blessed us with petrol, it must be ridiculously cheap or else there will be trouble?
I know that a thousand and one readers who will send reactions will wonder why our government has not thought it fit to establish new refineries so we can have petroleum products cheaply at home and spare us all the trouble associated with petroleum products imports. We all, including my humble self, have been asking this question for decades now.
Since for whatever reasons our governments over the years have felt that we should not have refineries, I will not keep asking that question and fail to deal with the ominous reality I see on the ground. That is not the mark of a wise man.
The danger facing all of us today is that if we stick doggedly to our stand that petrol subsidy should not be removed and a reign of deregulation instituted in that sector, in the next few years nearly a half of our annual spending will be on this single item. Sooner or later, what God meant for us as a blessing, will become a curse that will bury the nation.
I humbly call on the NLC, activists, patriots, pundits and commentators to please have a re-think on this issue and give President Jonathan the courage to put an end to a matter that has the potential to torpedo our blessed country. I sincerely believe that the cause of national development will be greatly served if we commentators and sundry national do-gooders learn to exhibit some humility by agreeing that sometimes we can be well meaning but decisively wrong and that we do not have a monopoly of patriotism.
If those the AIT was celebrating as heroes fully understand the cost this nation has suffered as a result of their well meaning but misguided fight, they will be in mourning rather than in celebration. Their self- proclaimed victory is no more than a pyrrhic one – it is much more costly than a defeat.