Subsidy: A responsible government would not increase the hardship of its own people — Sani

The immediate past Secretary General of Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), Mr. Anthony Sani, has condemned the removal of fuel subsidy and hike in electricity tariff by the Buhari administration especially at a time Nigerians are struggling to manage their lives.


Sani in an interview with Daily Sun, said a wise government should have considered the challenges facing the masses and try to ease their pain, instead of increasing it. He however, noted that the Buhari administration's decision is based on the fact that it obviously lacked the resources to sustain the payment of subsidy.

He said, "It is very hard not to be worried about the effects of the hikes of the prices of these two essential items on the lives of Nigerians at a time of COVID-19, which has brought about more hardships and, thus, attracts stimulus to cushion the effects across the globe.

"Nigerians equally deserve some cushioning and not more hardships. I understand the government is equally sad. But the reality is that we must know that any stimulus for cushioning is a function of availability of resources, which are not available at this time.



"And since both fuel subsidy and the electricity generation, transmission as well as the distribution are now in private hands by way of privatization, it seems the only option left for the government is for the regime to let go the subsidy, which the government cannot sustain any longer not so much as matter of wish than of paucity of resources.

"To allow supply of these two essential products to be no more on account of government’s inability to sustain the subsidy cannot be an option. One can only hope the suppliers of these products would know that they exist to deliver services to consumers whose satisfaction with the services by way of volume, quality and prices are over and above any other consideration. I pray the marketers would be humane, moral and wise in their management practices."




On the proposed 4th amendment of the 1999 constitution by the NASS, he said, "As a person, I do not believe the problems of Nigeria have to do with the constitution but in our distorted values, attitudes and the way we do things.

"America is 243 years old and its constitution, which is less than five pages has only about 30 amendments. Britain does not even operate a written constitution. Nigeria has a book called the constitution that is observed more in the breach.


"A constitution should derive from national ideals, values, natural justice and common decency, which most citizens share and hold dear that glue the country together. We cannot expect everything to be written in the constitution. And that may explain why some people do not have faith in the endless exercise of constitutional amendments that do not improve the quality of the politics and standard of living of the citizens."