Date Published: 10/18/11

Fuel subsidy removal: Ogunsola, ex-Punch boss advises govt

Former Chairman, Punch Nigeria Limited, Chief Ajibola Ogunsola, Tuesday  described the proposal as a fall-out of fraud and mismanagement of public funds. He said that government’s insensitivity to the fight against alleged corruption in the downstream sector of the oil industry has bedeviled efforts at making the refineries functional.

According to the former Chairman, Newspapers Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN), “it is because of this line of reasoning that many people are saying that there is no subsidy to be removed that what constitutes subsidy now is the consequence of government corruption, mismanagement and fraud which has prevented the local refinery from being functional and expanded.”

He said in a statement: “Those who seem to know go further to allege that the local refineries are being deliberately sabotaged to pave the way for continued massive importation of petroleum from which many highly placed government protégés are defrauding the country.  They also argue that what is required for sanity is to expose such people, hold them to account and institute a corruption-free system.  But we have to admit that firstly that is not yet about to happen and that in any case, government control of the system would always inevitably be riddled with corruption and nepotism.

“Now, from the country’s past salutary experience of deregulation of previously government-controlled monopolies and abolition of import licensing, one wonders whether the best thing would not be to get the government out of the way.”
His fears, “as long as government continues to be involved in the local refining and importation of petroleum with all the associated inefficiencies and corruption, the economic and political tension involved in subsidy removal debates will continue to come up from time-to-time especially when crude oil prices rise and whenever the naira weakens against the US dollar.”

He advised that “government must get out of the way. Refinery construction and petrol importation; storage and distribution should be thrown open, subject only to quality control.  The refineries should also be privatized.”