The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has criticised former Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s proposal to restore fuel subsidy, saying it could recreate the economic crisis associated with the former subsidy regime.
NANS President, Comrade Akinteye Babatunde Afeez, said the association’s position was not politically motivated but based on what it considered to be in the best interest of the country.
In a statement issued yesterday Afeez said the students standpoint does not stem from a partisan position, but rather from a patriotic one.
He said NANS had a responsibility to assess government policies objectively and speak out on issues of national importance, stressing that the association’s mandate extended beyond student welfare.
According to him, the removal of fuel subsidy was undoubtedly difficult for Nigerians, who had become accustomed to the benefits of the scheme. However, he argued that a review of the country’s economic performance during and after the subsidy era showed the need for reform.
“Every sane and patriotic citizen who is conversant with our nation’s economy will agree with me that the removal of the fuel subsidy was a difficult but necessary economic reform,” he said.
Afeez noted that the subsidy regime consumed trillions of naira, disproportionately benefited higher fuel consumers, encouraged smuggling and limited the government’s ability to invest in critical sectors.
He also acknowledged that subsidy removal had caused severe short-term hardship through higher fuel, transport and food costs, but maintained that it had also created greater fiscal space and reduced what he described as a major distortion in the economy.
However, the NANS president said the success of the reform should not be measured by government savings alone, but by how effectively the resources freed by the policy were deployed.
“The real measure of the reform should not be the savings alone, but what the government does with those savings,” he said.
He therefore rejected calls for an outright return of fuel subsidy without a clear structural framework for addressing the weaknesses that made the policy unsustainable.
“This is why calls or promises for the outright return of subsidy, without a clear structural framework for addressing the fundamental weaknesses that made the policy unsustainable in the first place, amount to little more than a political response to a genuine economic challenge,” he added.
The NANS president urged Nigerians not to allow the immediate hardship caused by economic reforms to undermine the need for long-term restructuring.
He called on the government to ensure that resources saved from subsidy removal were prudently deployed to improve the living conditions of Nigerians and make the sacrifices being made today beneficial in the future.
