ccording to Mr. Oladele who was the former chief of staff to the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and member-elect of the House of Representatives representing Egbado (Yewa) North/Imeko-Afon Federal constituency in Ogun State, the Federal Government is owing major oil marketers in Nigeria several Billions of Naira without any intention of paying them before the Jonathan’s administration wind up on May 29th, 2015. The Minister of Finance, Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has told the oil marketers point blank that Jonathan’s administration would not pay them.
Just as the fuel scarcity is biting hard in many parts of the country, particularly in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory and Lagos where residents grapple with fuel shortage which hit the country last weekend, a Federal legislator-elect, Mr. Kayode Oladele has attributed the cause of the scarcity to economic sabotage, corruption and insensitivity on the part of the Federal government.
According to Mr. Oladele who was the former chief of staff to the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and member-elect of the House of Representatives representing Egbado (Yewa) North/Imeko-Afon Federal constituency in Ogun State, the Federal Government is owing major oil marketers in Nigeria several Billions of Naira without any intention of paying them before the Jonathan’s administration wind up on May 29th, 2015. “The Minister of Finance, Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has told the oil marketers point blank that Jonathan’s administration would not pay them. Rather, she told them that government is a continuum and that the indebtedness shall be passed on to the in-coming Buhari administration. Jonathan’s administration is insensitive to the trauma an average Nigerian is currently going through as a result of the fuel scarcity. First the Ministry of Finance told the country last week that N156 Billion had been released to the oil marketers in order to ease the scarcity but our investigation has revealed that this statement was nothing but an outright fabrication. Again, the Jonathan Administration has through the 2015 Appropriation Bill, removed fuel subsidy, a situation that might put the incoming Buhari’s regime on a collision course with Nigerians. It is very important to know which government to hold responsible for the removal of subsidy”, Oladele has said.
Speaking further, Oladele said that “Nigeria remains a land of paradoxes- even though the country is blessed and richly endowed; Nigerians have remained impoverished and (sometimes) stereotyped to be one of the poorest in the world. Fuel scarcity in a country that produces oil is one of our paradoxes: if the scarcity evens out today, I can assure you that no new importation is taking place for now, the marketers will just be supplying us from their reservoirs but very soon, the tanks will dry up and we will be back to the same position unless we have the final word on the subsidy matter and the marketers get paid. . For now, the marketers and the government are engaged in a hide and seek game and we don’t know who will blink first. The situation is pathetic for all of us to say the least”, he said.
“The past few years have been characterized by economic mismanagement, insensitivity and lack of political will to move the nation forward. In all, there is no inclusive economic growth and development to take care of the poor, provide jobs for the unemployed and take care of the aged. We haven’t had it this bad as a country. For the first time in our history, federal judges including the Court of Appeals and Supreme Court justices were owed salary areas in the first quarter of 2015 which were only recently settled. I also have on good authority that the federal civil servants also bear a part of the crunch as they are being owed months of arrears of salary, yet the PDP’s government squandered billions of tax payers’ money on President Jonathan’s failed re-election bid”, Oladele concluded.