OpeOluwani Akintayo
Lagos — The Trade Union Congress, TUC and the National Executive Council, NEC headed by Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo will today meet over the planned removal of the fuel subsidy by the Federal Government.
Nuhu Toro, TUC Deputy Secretary, Nuhu Toro disclosed this ahead of the NEC meeting holding in Abuja this morning.
According to him, the Council will at the meeting, consider the adoption of a report by its ad hoc committee on fuel subsidy removal and the increase of petrol price to N302 per litre.
An online news medium, The Cable, reported on Wednesday that a committee of the National Economic Council had recommended that petrol should be sold at N302 per litre from February when the government would cease to subsidise petroleum products in the country.
The report explained that NEC made the recommendations last November. The recommendations were reportedly put forward by the NEC ad-hoc committee interfacing with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation on the appropriate pricing of PMS in Nigeria.
The report was said to have been presented by Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State and the head of the committee.
It also recommended that all retailers should post PMS prices at all times on a designated website and smartphone app — and they are expected to post price changes no earlier than within 15 minutes of the price change.
With the recommendations, the committee added that the federal government would save N250 billion per month on petrol subsidy removal.
“At current rates, the PMS subsidy is reducing transfers into the federation by about NGN 250 billion per month, and could, if PMS subsidies are not eliminated, result in deductions of NGN 3 trillion in 2022.
“The large-scale time-limited (six-month) cash transfer proposed as a way of transferring the subsidy “directly to the people” would cost N600bn but would by paving the way for the elimination of PMS subsidies, enable the federation to recover N3tn in revenues that would otherwise go to PMS subsidies.
“If PMS subsidies are eliminated by February 2022, N250 billion in deductions would have been incurred, but the remaining N195 billion in anticipated PMS subsidy deductions could be redirected towards FGN funding of the cash-transfer programme,” The Cable said in its report.
NEC also consist of all 36 governors, and other federal officials.
Toro added that the congress will disclose its decision after that meeting.
However, Vice-President’s Spokesman, Laolu Akande, on Twitter said the discussions were still ongoing and NEC had not yet taken any decision.
“While there are indeed ongoing discussions on the issue of fuel subsidy, at no time has NEC made any such resolution,” Akande said on Twitter.
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