Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde has declared he won’t reinstate Nigeria’s fuel subsidy if elected president, instead proposing a fundamentally different approach to petroleum pricing. Speaking at his campaign office inauguration in Abuja on Monday, the Allied Peoples Movement candidate outlined a system he believes will deliver real benefits without the inefficiencies of past policies.
Here’s the key shift. Rather than subsidizing petrol at the pump, Makinde wants domestic refineries to receive crude oil at preferential rates from the start. According to him, this approach builds advantages into the supply chain itself, ensuring Nigerians benefit from their own resources without opaque interventions after costs have already spiraled.
“Nigeria oil must provide a real and measurable benefit to Nigerians,” he told the crowd. “That benefit should be built into the system from the beginning through the price at which crude oil is supplied for domestic refining, not through an opaque intervention at the petrol pump after all the cost inefficiencies and distortions have been added.”
The proposal comes as Nigeria continues grappling with fuel pricing controversies following President Tinubu’s removal of subsis. Whether voters will embrace Makinde’s alternative remains uncertain, but he’s betting transparency will trump the old system’s acknowledged failures.
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