The Federal Government has blamed the lingering fuel scarcity across the country on the poor management of the subsidy regime by the immediate past administration of President Goodluck Jonathan. Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, while briefing journalists on the outcome of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting said the inability of the past government to adequately make provision for subsidy payment has caused the current fuel crisis. FEC met yesterday to consider the 2016 apprpriation bill, which is expected to be presented by President Muhammadu Buhari today to a joint session of the National Assembly.

Mohammed told reporters that the mishandling of the fuel importation strategy by the last administration in a defective manner pushed the country into the present fuel scarcity. According to him, “What I will be telling Nigerians about fuel situation is that what we met on ground is such that we are paying for the sins of the last administration.”

He recalled that a fortnight ago, the Buhari administration presented a supplementary budget before the National Assembly of N674 billion, out of which, N522 billon was used to pay outstanding arrears of fuel subsidy incurred as far back as August last year. Mohammed said:
“So one of the reasons there is still fuel scarcity was the inability of the last government to make adequate provision for the fuel subsidy. Now yes, we do face other logistics problems, but majorly, we are paying for the sins of the last administration. “The solution is the strategy the Buhari administration is adopting.

The first thing is to make sure that unlike before, when the marketers used to import the major percentage of the product, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has been involved in importation because some of the marketers have ceased importing the products in the last couple of months.

“If you see any fuel anywhere today, it was imported by the NNPC. Of course, the problem we also inherited, which is the vandalism of the pipelines, has made it impossible for us to even transport the fuel.” He said the council deliberated on two major items including the 2016 budget and a memo from the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN) seeking to review the current tax policy of the country. Speaking on the proposed review of the tax law, the Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, explained that government intends to strengthen the existing tax laws to block loopholes and boost its earnings.

“It is basically looking at the taxation laws and trying to look at the policies behind them and see whether any of them needs strengthening, that was it. It is a review to see where there are gaps, or if there were any aspect if it that requires strengthening. “It is also because there were some inadequacies observed in the present tax regime, and these lapses have been exploited by both individuals and corporate organisations towards remitting taxes that has led to loss of revenue to the government. So, the new tax review is aimed at plugging these loopholes,” Udoma said.

Udoma, who declined to give details of the planned review, said it would be (Click on the link below to read more)
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