Anambra Civil Society Network (ACSONET) a foremost Citizens and stakeholders group, has enjoined Governor Charles Chukwuma Soludo of Anambra State to alleviate the effects of fuel subsidy removal on the citizens, through provision of palliatives and other social safety nets.
Leader of the group, Prince Chris Azor who gave the advice while contributing to issues around the current hardship faced by citizens said the step would address the current existential challenges faced by the populace especially, poor and vulnerable citizens.
According to Prince Azor who doubles as the Non State Actors Citizens Co-chair, Open Government Partnership (OGP), attention should not be on the Federal Government alone.
“State Governments must intervene effectively and put in place strategies to bring out their own palliatives with other sustainable Social Protection mechanisms to alleviate the excruciating pains inflicted on the Masses by subsidy removal,” he said.
The human rights advocate reminded Anambra State Government that Sister States like, Lagos, Kwara and Edo etc have already put various measures in place to cushion the effects on their people.
Recall that following President Bola Tinubu’s inaugural speech on May 29 in which he declared that “fuel subsidy is gone”, fuel costs skyrocketed across the country, leading to calls for palliatives to mitigate the effects of the policy.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on July 7 directed the National Economic Council (NEC) led by Vice President Kashim Shettima to begin the process of working on interventions to mitigate the impact of subsidy removal on the Nigerians.
Similarly, the World Bank recently called on the Federal Government to reallocate part of the savings from fuel subsidy removal to reduce the suffering of Nigerians worsened by the negative impact of the policy.
Making this call in its latest Nigeria Development Update, NDU, the World Bank noted that an additional 7.1 million Nigerians would be pushed into poverty, especially without measures to compensate for the negative impact of subsidy removal on the populace.
According to the World Bank “In the immediate term, the removal of the petrol subsidy has caused an increase in prices, adversely affecting poor and economically insecure Nigerian households.
The World Bank went further to state that “In the immediate term, the removal of the petrol subsidy has caused an increase in prices, adversely affecting poor and economically insecure Nigerian households”
Petrol prices appear to have almost tripled, following the subsidy removal. The poor and economically insecure households who directly purchase and use petrol as well as those that indirectly consume petrol, are adversely affected by the price increase.
‘’Petrol prices appear to have almost tripled, following the subsidy removal. The poor and economically insecure households who directly purchase and use petrol as well as those that indirectly consume petrol, are adversely affected by the consequential price increase.
Many current, as well as newly, poor and economically insecure households, will likely resort to coping mechanisms that will have long-term adverse consequences, such as not sending children to school, or not going to the health facilities to seek preventative healthcare or cutting back on nutritious dietary choices.” the report said
