••• SAYS NNPC NOW A MONEY PIT, NOT A CASH COW
A former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria and deposed 14th Emir of Kano, Lamido Sanusi, has called for the unbundling and consequent disbandment of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited.
Sanusi said that the NNPC has become ‘a money pit rather than a “cash cow.”
Sanusi made the call while delivering an address as the keynote speaker at the Seventh edition of the Kaduna Investment Summit with the topic ‘Improving subnational resilience against global economic shocks’ in Kaduna on Saturday.
The event was organised by the Kaduna Investment Promotion Agency.
The former CBN Governor used a variety of economic indices to fault the volume of Nigeria’s daily purported consumption of petrol as claimed by the NNPC.
He said that the NNPC’s position that the nation consumes 66 million liters of petrol daily was incredible and should be probed.
Sanusi called on the next government to find out from the insurance companies if the vessels that were said to have brought fuel into the country were truly in the country at those particular periods.
Sanusi who dismissed the NNPC figure as untrue queried if Nigerians were drinking the 66 million liters of petrol per day.
“Are we drinking the petrol?” He queried
He recalled that the country which was importing 40 million litres in 2019 now imports 66 million litres according to the NNPC which amounts to fifty percent increase in fuel consumption in three years.
Sanusi argued that it is inconceivable for the NNPC to assume that the nation increased its fuel consumption rate by fifty percent in three years.
Attributing the precarious financial situation in the country to what he described as a subsidy m-free-for-all, Sanusi stressed that the NNPC should be unbundled and disbanded to prevent the company from its current state as a cash cow for a few Nigerians.
He said, “NNPC tells us officially that we are consuming 66 million litres per day. We are consuming more than Indonesia, Pakistan, Egypt, Cote d’Ivoire, more than Kenya.
“In 2019 officially, we were importing 40 million litres per day. In 2022, officially, we are importing 66 million per day. In three years, we have increased our petrol consumption by 50%. Please tell me, is it the population? Is it the number of cars? Just ask yourself if it makes sense that in three years you increase your consumption of petrol by 50%.
Sanusi lamented that Nigeria is operated in such a way that it makes billionaires of those in control of the country.
“Nigeria has continued to be a rentier state. It does not exist for development but as a sight of rent, and extraction to make those who control the state rich to turn them into billionaires overnight.
He lamented that only 50 percent of states in the country generates revenue to cover recurrent expenditure.
According to him Nigeria spent N2.597 trillion for debt servicing for the first half of 2022 while revenue was N2.4 trillion which amounted to 108 percent of total revenue.
“In other words, debt service is now 108 percent of revenue. Every naira the Federal Government earns goes to service debt and it is not enough, it has to borrow to service the debt, and then begin to pay salaries, borrow to pay overheads, borrow to build roads.
“Let me ask you: what do you think we are leaving our children behind (with)? A mountain of debt. Every generation wants to leave a legacy so that our children and grandchildren will be praying for us and ask God for mercy on us, not cursing us.
“You leave them with a mountain of debt, you have not educated them, money that will should put into their education, into their healthcare, even assuming this fuel subsidy is genuine, we have taking that money to give ourselves cheap petrol. We are borrowing to enjoy cheap petrol so that our children will oay that debt.
“We see the problem and we are going to continue. I’m sorry for the next president who comes in June and says I’m removing fuel subsidy on day one. I don’t know what kind of political stability you’ll have,” Sanusi stated.
The Minister of State, Industry, Trade and Investment, Maryam Katagum, represented President Buhari at the event
Others at the event were the Presidential Candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, Aliko Dangote, Governors Nasir El-Rufai (Kaduna), Abubakar Bagudu (Kebbi), and Abubakar Badaru (Jigawa).
The Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai had earlier called for the privatization of the NNPC on Thursday .