IMPI CHALLENGES ATIKU, OBI TO PUBLIC DEBATE ON SUBSIDY RESTORATION; DEMANDS ANSWERS TO CRITICAL FISCAL POSERS
The Independent Media and Policy Initiative (IMPI) has issued a direct challenge to the Presidential candidates of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, and the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Peter Obi to engage the Nigerian public on the practical implementability of their proposed fuel subsidy restoration plans.
The policy group threw the challenge in a policy statement signed by its Chairman, Dr Omoniyi Akinsiju.
While inviting the presidential candidates to publicly debate the policy framework of their subsidy restoration advocacy, the IMPI Chairman noted that both opposition figures continue to offer attractive populist rhetorics without providing a transparent, mathematically sound blueprint for how their policy alternatives would operate without bankrupting the federation.
According to Akinsiju, “political campaign promises must be anchored on rigorous policy logic rather than economic illusions designed for temporary electoral appeal.
“If Candidate Atiku’s proposed ‘production subsidy’ model or Candidate Obi’s alternative framework are viable economic solutions, both leaders must step forward and directly answer the following critical posers ranging from
ownership and equity, revenue deficit, arbitrage and smuggling, legal framework, and budgetary transparency.
“How do you intend to compel joint-venture international oil companies (IOCs) and private crude producers—who own significant equity shares in Nigerian crude oil—to sell their commercial assets to domestic refiners at government-mandateddiscounted rates without triggering massive international arbitration, breaching contracts, and causing investor flight?
“With crude oil sales serving as the main source of foreign exchange and revenue for the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC), how will your administration cover the trillions of Naira in monthly revenue shortfalls to states and local governments that a ‘crude discount’ or ‘production subsidy’ will inevitably cause?
“Under a deregulated regional market, what specific administrative mechanisms will you put in place to prevent discounted domestic crude or subsidized refined products from being diverted across borders for profit, replicating the massive cross-border arbitrage that characterized the previous under-recovery regime?”
Continuing, Dr Akinsiju argued that there are also legal framework and budget transparency hurdles awaiting proponents of the subsidy return advocacy.
“How do you plan to reconcile a return to price-fixing or crude price differentials with the explicit statutory mandates of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) of 2021, which legally enforces full deregulation and market-driven pricing in the downstream sector?”
“Will your proposed support differentials be explicitly captured in the national budget passed by the National Assembly, or do you intend to revert to off-budget, unappropriated under-recovery deductions by NNPC Limited that previously depleted public finances and ballooned “Ways and Means” debt?”, he asked.
Akinsiju asserted that the Nigerian electorate deserves complete policy clarity, not just populist rhetorics.
“Re-entering a subsidy regime under any name—whether branded as a ‘production subsidy’ or an ‘interim welfare bridge’—threatens to reverse hard-won fiscal stability, endanger international credit standing, and derail the long-term path toward energy independence driven by domestic refining and local currency crude transactions”
“So we challenge Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Mr. Peter Obi to move beyond generalized criticism and present a step-by-step, empirically-backed implementation roadmap that addresses these fundamental questions before the Nigerian public”, he added.
End.
