Afenifere Tackles President Tinubu, Says He Is Imposing On Nigerians Hurried Policies

By Ayodele Oni

The Yoruba apex socio-cultural organization, Afenifere, has observed that the removal of subsidy on petrol, with attendant hike in pump price, and increase in fees payable in schools have further compounded the poverty ratio of Nigerians.

In a statement in Akure, on Friday, the organization’s Secretary General, Sola Ebiseni, described the hurried policies as “latest blow on an already traumatized citizenry.”

Describing the policy as thoughtless, the statement said: “It is feared that this latest gross act of thoughtless policy implementation and its unintended consequences will further push Nigeria’s economy down the slope as Nigeria has officially overtaken India as the New Poverty Capital of the World.

“Nigeria, despite being touted as the 55th largest economy in the world currently ranks 142 out of 167 on the global prosperity index with the expected total number of Nigerians plunged into the deep end of multidimensional poverty to gross 133 million before the end of 2024.

“In the same vein, the number of extremely poor Nigerians for the same period is estimated to hit 71 million which may now be compounded by the multiplier effects of peremptory removal of petrol subsidy, intractable fall of the Naira and surreptitious increase in school fees payable in Federal Government secondary and tertiary educational institutions.

“While the top three Presidential candidates in the last election agreed that the wasteful and corruption- infested Petrol Subsidy had to go, no one however, expected that the Subsidy would be removed in the sudden manner it was done: a seeming off-the-cuff declaration of the removal of the subsidy, totally ignoring the impact on the people and the economy.

“Such a huge economic decision with clear potential for serious deleterious impact on disposable incomes of the already impoverished citizens should never have been made in the cavalier manner as was witnessed.

“It is indeed a matter of grave concern that a party and its candidate which made subsidy removal a cardinal campaign issue, did not have a plan on ground to introduce the necessary countervailing palliatives simultaneously to protect the people and the economy.

“Progressive” governance, which they have always professed, would have put ahead of everything, the welfare of the citizens and should never be, or made to seem like, an afterthought.

“Those whom our warped and strange constitution have put in the saddle while their legitimacy is yet subject of judicial inquiry are nonetheless expected to act expeditiously to restore hope to the weak in society and protect the economy by introducing quickly, the much needed palliative measures.

“Hitting the ground running is more than a slogan or braggadocio declaration, the run must be well coordinated by competent hands available nationwide and not confined to actors whose efforts have only been exaggerated by the spatial limits of their past endeavours.”