A Senior Nigerian advocate, Itse Sagay, recently spoke on the policies implemented by President Bola Tinubu, which have seen Nigerians experience hardship.
According to Sagay, the decision of the President to remove the oil subsidy without planning for local replacement of petrol or local production of fuel was a wrong step.
Speaking in an interview with Sunday Sun, he noted that President Tinubu should have waited a little for the Dangote refinery and Port Harcourt refinery to be functioning before acting
Sagay, while listing the President’s mistakes, said, “I think this government has good reforms that can transform this country. We have the competence and the manpower that can make life easy for Nigerians and our economy will improve. But as I have always stated the mistake that President Tinubu made was removing oil subsidy without planning for local replacement of petrol or local production of fuel.
That has always been my advocacy. What is the cause of the high cost of petrol? Transport abroad to and fro, port charges, various taxes at the port etc, those are the things. But if we produce locally, all those things are gone and so the price will remain the same or even go down. My argument has always been; once local production starts, the issue of subsidy removal will be tackled. For me, that is the mistake of this government.
They could have waited a bit. The production from Port Harcourt refinery which I think should be at the end of this month and the Dangote refinery with its millions of crude already stored… if they had waited for this refineries to start production, we will not notice the removal of subsidy because as one goes, the other one automatically replaces it. So, local production is the answer because once we start local production, the price of petrol will come down and all our suffering will reduce and will also come down.”
