By Omoyeni Ojeifo
The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Sen. Heineken Lokpobiri, has stoutly defended the complete removal of the fuel subsidy, framing it as an essential economic defence measure for Nigeria.
Addressing current macroeconomic challenges, Lokpobiri emphasized that bold administrative policy prevented severe national collapse and safeguarded the federation’s core financial structure.
“This decision was made at the right time and if it wasn’t made then, Nigeria would have been like Venezuela,” Lokpobiri said, in an interview on Channels TV, monitored by PersecondNews on Tuesday.
He clarified that the Federal Government no longer intervenes directly to manipulate pump costs, pointing out that current market structures are guided strictly by international market indicators.
“The Bola Tinubu government doesn’t have any power to reduce or increase the price of petrol because it is completely deregulated in line with global best standards,” he noted.
The minister addressed assumptions that local crude production and domestic refining capacity should drastically drive down retail costs, noting that crude pricing remains bound to universal standard benchmarks regardless of local refining facilities.
“Crude oil and refined products are a global business and Nigeria doesn’t exist in isolation from global energy dynamics,” he stressed.
He firmly rejected claims of artificially capping prices below market rates, stating that doing so would directly undermine current market deregulation policies and fiscal stability goals established by law.
“You cannot arbitrarily reduce prices unless you want to roll back to subsidies which would destroy our economy completely,” he added.
While Addressing critiques regarding domestic crude sales to local refineries, the Minister reiterated that crude allocations carry uniform cost structures regardless of processing destination.
“They sell crude to the refinery at the same global price so refined product prices stay tied to crude costs,” Lokpobiri stressed.
Highlighting wider macroeconomic shifts, Lokpobiri pointed out that international market forces dictate fuel costs globally, making local price isolation impossible.
“The energy cost is a global thing and its effect is a global thing affecting purchasing power everywhere across the world,” he said.
Breaking down the astronomical fiscal toll of maintaining the former subsidy regime, the Minister offered concrete metrics regarding the daily and annual strain placed on the national treasury.
“Before removal, Nigeria was spending ₦18.4 billion daily, which at today’s exchange rate would mean ₦21 trillion annually spent subsidizing fuel,” the minister said.
He also linked the removal of the subsidy to increased monthly allocations from the Federation Account Allocation Committee, FAAC, to the three tiers of government.
“Today when FAAC meets every month, we share between ₦2.1 trillion to ₦2.3 trillion among government tiers, which has never happened before,” he added.
The Federal Government has continued to prioritize structural support mechanisms, expanding CNG transport infrastructure and providing welfare funds to mitigate local energy costs across the federation, he said.