Adaobi Rhema Oguejiofor
The Executive Director of Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, has criticized the proposed N8,000 monthly palliative to be issued by the Federal Government for 12 million households from fuel subsidy savings, describing it as unfortunate.
Rafsanjani suggested that the Federal Government should instead, use the subsidy savings to fix the transport and energy sector rather than putting it into a wasteful exercise, as 27 percent of the country’s average household depends on fuel-related expenses. He added that the fund be redirected to the development of infrastructure in the country.
According to him, the palliative, which will be funded through a loan, will add to the country’s debt burden, as Nigeria already has a high debt profile and does not need to incur more debt to distribute palliatives.
In his own words, “the insensitivity behind this is alarming, particularly in light of the country’s growing and unsustainable debt profile.
“At this crucial time of post-COVID recovery when the increasing cost of governance underpinned by high personnel and overhead costs are weighing down on the federation, steps should be taken towards restructuring and rationalizing government parastatals, agencies, and commissions in order to address these costs. 30 percent of the annual budgets barely goes into capital projects, the government has never achieved more than 40 percent budget performance and domestic and local debts are piling.”
Rafsanjani expressed that given the current fiscal situation in Nigeria, there must be stringent measures to address the depletions and deficits.
The Executive Director, who heads Transparency International in Nigeria, noted that another reason for his kicking against the disbursement of palliative is due to the lack of transparency by the government, which according to him, was seen during the Covid-19 pandemic.
He said that there has to be a guarantee of transparency in the disbursement of the new palliative, adding that the palliatives should be disbursed through the 774 local government areas in the country, at 1.04 billion naira per local government.