Fuel subsidy removal: President Tinubu seeks senate approval for N500 billion palliatives

President Bola Tinubu has written to the Senate seeking the approval of the sum of N500 billion for palliatives to cushion the effect of the recent fuel subsidy removal on poor and vulnerable Nigerians.

This is coming barely 24 hours after a similar request of the president was read on the floor of the House of Representatives by the speaker, Tajudeen Abbas.

The request was contained in a letter to the Senate and was read by the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, during plenary on Thursday. July 13, 2023.

What the president is saying

The letter which is titled “Request for the amendment of the 2022 Supplementary Appropriation Act,” reads, “I write to request the approval of the Senate for the amendment of the 2022 Supplementary Appropriation Act.

• “The request has become necessary in order to among other things, source the funds necessary to provide palliatives to mitigate the effect of the recent removal of fuel subsidy on Nigerians.
• “The sum of N500 billion had been extracted from the 2022 Supplementary Appropriation Act of N819,536,937,815 for the provision of palliatives to Nigerians to cushion the effect of fuel subsidy removal.”

Akpabio thereafter referred the letter to the Committee of the Whole for consideration.

What you should know

Recall that President Bola Tinubu during his inaugural speech on May 29, 2023, announced that fuel subsidy is gone as there was no provision for that in the 2023 budget from July 1.

The President pledged his administration’s support to channel the money to provide basic infrastructural needs to Nigerians.

The action of the president has been backed by some stakeholders and interest groups including state governors, legislators, oil marketers, and economic and financial experts, among several others.

However, this did not go that well with organized labour due to the spike in the pump price of petrol, leading to a declaration of a planned strike action and protest by the NLC and TUC.

The strike was however suspended on the backdrop of the judgment of the Industrial Court which restrained them from going ahead with the strike as well as the outcome of the meeting between the leadership of the organized labour and representatives of the Federal Government.

The Federal Government and organized labour had in June set an 8-week deadline for fuel subsidy removal palliatives.