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Falana urges FG to ban petrol importation
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Human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, SAN, has urged the federal government to end petrol importation and ensure that the 450,000 barrels of crude oil reportedly allocated daily for domestic consumption are supplied to local refineries.
Mr Falana said making crude available to domestic refiners would reduce Nigeria’s dependence on imported petroleum products and help ease the hardship caused by the removal of the petrol subsidy.
The lawyer spoke on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics on Sunday amid renewed debate over the economic impact of President Bola Tinubu’s decision to remove petrol subsidy in May 2023.
Falana argued that although the subsidy regime was unsustainable and was plagued by alleged fraud, Nigerians have yet to see sufficient benefits from the additional revenue accruing to the three tiers of government since its removal.
“State governors are getting more allocations. The federal government is getting more money. Local governments are getting more funds on paper. It is the duty of the Nigerian people now to demand accountability,” he said.
He questioned the basis for some of the consumption figures previously used to justify petrol subsidy payments, citing discrepancies between reported daily consumption and volumes supplied to the market.
“At a point, we were told that local consumption, the rate of local consumption, was 68 million litres per day. Yet the NNPC claimed then that it was supplying the market to the tune of over 98 million litres per day,” Mr Falana said.
The senior lawyer also questioned why Nigeria continues to import petroleum products despite having operational local refineries.
He said the continued dependence on imports was difficult to justify when the country had crude oil and growing refining capacity. (Premium Times)
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