By Sunday Elom
A civil rights advocacy group under the aegis of Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has charged President Muhammadu Buhari to reverse the market price of cooking gas [Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG)] to its price before he assumed office in 2015.
The group’s National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, who made the charge while speaking with newsmen during the weekend said that Nigerians have nothing to rejoice over about the recent meager reduction in the cost of cooking gas in the country, saying that the marginal reduction which is less than N1,000 is not enough.
Onwubiko argued that “The failure of the relevant governmental bodies to regulate the pricing of gas assets in Nigeria is a recipe for encouraging the ballooning poverty situations that we have witnessed since 2015 that President Muhammadu Buhari has operated economic policy frameworks devoid of progressive mechanisms.”
According to the coordinator, “Government lacks the requisite political will, sincerity of purpose and commitments to do the needful to ensure that millions of homes in Nigeria are not subjected to economic ordeals just so they can get gas to power the preparations of their foods and other essential services domestically and otherwise.
He lamented that “High costs of gas has led to the closure of many restaurants and small businesses thereby increasing unemployment rates in Nigeria. The high cost of gas has affected the green environment and this shows that this government is hypocritical when it mouths her readiness to take remedial steps to halt the consequences of climate change.”
“All those international trips costing the taxpayers billions of naira by the President and retinue of ministers to attend climate change-related global summits without taking local steps to check unaffordable costs of gas resources in Nigeria is cosmetic and hypocritical,” he added.
He insisted that President Buhari should return the price of cooking gas to what it was in 2015, as he maintained that “This government is unrepentantly incompetent.”
The human rights advocate said that “The government derives satisfaction in imposing outrageous and satanic economic policies on Nigerians. This is even why the government has decided to tax us more for drinking soft drinks even when wives of politically exposed officials buy champagnes and expensive wines at public costs for their own enjoyment in their cocoons.”
Recently, the price of 12.5kg of cooking had dropped from N8,800 to between N8400 and N8200 at some gas stations/outlets while at some locations, the price dropped to between N7,800 and N8,000.
The price of the product had increased from N3,000 to N10,200, an increase of 240 per cent per 12.5kg in the first quarter of 2021.
The hypertentive increase of the price of the product forced some users to resort to use of charcoal and firewood, a practice that encourages climate change.
However, the Programme Manager of the National Liquified Petroleum Gas Expansion Implementation Plan, Office of the Vice President, Dayo Adeshina, had assured that the federal government was making plans to further reduce the cost of cooking gas across the country.
Be the first to know when we publish an update
