Bola Tinubu, the Presidential candidate for the All Progressives Congress, has stated that, if elected in the elections held next year, his administration will gradually eliminate fuel subsidy.
In addition to gradually eliminating fuel subsidy, he pledged to speed up the Petroleum Industry Act’s implementation and to put in place additional beneficial measures to entice investment in Deepwater assets within six months.
These were included in his manifesto on Friday.
He claims that if he is am elected, he would completely deregulate the downstream industry and make sure that the capacity of the nearby refineries is sufficient to meet the needs of domestic consumption.
He said, “We shall phase out the fuel subsidy yet maintain the underlying social contract between government and the people. We do this by dedicating the money that would have been used on the subsidy to fund targeted infrastructural, agricultural and social welfare programs ranging from road construction to boreholes, public transportation subsidies, and education and healthcare funding programs. In this way, the funds are more directly and better utilised to address urgent social and economic needs.
“Our planned approach will not only mitigate the price effects of deregulation but will also result in the significant expansion of public infrastructure and improvement of public well-being.
“Subsidy removal and deregulation are, however, only part of the solution. To further increase our refining capacity, we shall focus on the rehabilitation of the nation’s refineries and shall consider, as a model, the joint venture partnership arrangements implemented by other leading oil-producing states and global petrochemical firms.”
He added, “We will hasten the implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act and implement favourable policies to stimulate investment in the deep-water assets such as encouraging negotiations regarding signature bonus payment and/or deferral of the payment post development, royalty reliefs amongst others.”
