The Nigerian government on Tuesday confirmed an exclusive report by SIGNAL which hinted at the government’s removal of petrol subsidy and introduction of a policy that would establish a deregulation of the downstream sector.
SIGNAL had on Saturday exclusively broke the story of plans by the Nigerian government to remove fuel subsidy.
The Minister of State for petroleum resources, Ibe Kachickwu, confirmed SIGNAL’s report three days later on Tuesday.
Presidency sources informed about the development had told SIGNAL on Saturday that President Buhari has already started consultation with the leadership of the National Assembly and key Labour leaders before the official announcement.
Speaking in Kaduna during the second town hall meeting organised on Tuesday by the federal ministry of information and culture, Mr. Kachikwu confirmed that in the next few days, a new policy which is expected to help address the fuel scarcity crisis, would effectively take off.
“We are coming up with a new policy in the next few days that will allow our fuel price swing along with international pricing,” the minister said. “We are now transiting into fuel modulating pricing, because we do not have sufficient foreign exchange to continue fuel importation we have been doing”, Kachikwu said confirming another exclusive report by SIGNAL on Monday which revealed that the Nigerian government was broke and exchanging all its crude oil for refined petrol.
The minister said the introduction of price modulation mechanism early this year had helped stabilize the problem, pointing out that it was becoming necessary for the country’s oil sector to reflect global pricing of its fuel products.
To demonstrate the seriousness to end fuel subsidy payment in the country, Mr. Kachikwu said government deliberately did not have any budgetary allocation for fuel subsidy in the 2016 budget approved last week by the National Assembly.
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