Nigerians are suffering as a result of the removal of fuel subsidies, according to human rights attorney Femi Falana (SAN), who has urged the Federal Government to act quickly.
During a Friday night appearance on Channels TV’s Politics Today programme, Falana made the call.
He pointed out that the regime of fuel subsidies is a result of the government’s negligence and broken promises to reform the oil industry.
The irresponsibility of the Nigerian ruling class, he said, “will require the government to act swiftly to address the suffering of the people, undeserved pains inflicted on the people.”
The human rights attorney pointed out that Muhammadu Buhari, the recently outgoing president, broke his promise to fix all refineries when he took office in 2015 by failing to do so.
The federal government was therefore urged by the human rights activist to act quickly to lessen the suffering of the populace.
The President Bola Tinubu declared that “fuel subsidy is gone” in his inaugural speech on May 29. This action elicited a range of responses and increased the price of petrol nationwide.
Falana asserts that consideration of a policy’s effects on the populace is crucial when putting it into practise.
“It’s obvious that those who initially praised the removal of fuel subsidies are starting to understand the gravity of the crisis that it has caused for the nation. According to him, there is increasing pressure on the government to expedite the process of mitigating the effects of the removal.
He also urged the FG to look into the policy of fuel subsidies, which had been in place for many years.
“The government will have to look into that,” he said, “but there was undoubtedly a lot of fraud that characterised the management of fuel subsidy.”
