1- The major beneficiaries of fuel subsidy ARE average Nigerians (most especially the poor). Government keeps saying that the poor and average Nigerians do not benefit from subsidy, its a lie: N65 per litre of petrol or N120 - N150 per litre of petrol (PMS), do the math and tell us we are not benefiting!

2- INFLATION! Our major method of transporting ourselves and many products is by road, (think about how many goods including food are moved around the country in danfo's). If the cost of petrol doubles, there will be major inflation. Everyone will see it as an opportunity to increase the cost of their goods and services. Think about it: "your price is now N200, but just last week it was N100?" "Eh, na dem don increase fuel, my cost don shoot up". Imagine if u spend N10k on transport and your salary is N50k a month, what will u do when u have to spend N20k or N25k on transport? Will employers increase salaries and wages nationwide?

3- INFLATION again! If the Naira continues to devalue next year we will face higher inflation anyway (we are an import dependent nation), subsidy removal will greatly compound this.

4- The Federal Government (Presidency, Police, SSS, Military Intelligence, Navy, Customs etc etc) and its friends abroad (CIA, MI6, Mossad etc) are much more powerful and have much greater resources than the so called "Subsidy Mafia". If FG want to catch/expose/prosecute the Subsidy Mafia, they can. Don't say you have to remove subsidy because of the Mafia's fraud. Go after the Mafia, remove the fraud. This fraud includes inflation (saying u imported 20 million litres, when u only brought in 10 million), round tripping, smuggling products to bordering countries, importing 10 million litres and then exporting 9 million of it etc etc

5- We can drastically reduce the cost of subsidy. We spent approximately N600 billion on subsidy last year, this year we will spend around N1.5 trillion (please correct me if these figures are wrong). Oil prices have not risen significantly between '10 and '11, and level of consumption has not increased astronomically between '10 and '11, so why the huge increase? FG budgeted N220 billion for subsidy for 2011, I believe this is the true figure we should be spending. Remember that we are giving importers of PMS a N15 per litre margin for what is essentially a no risk business. If you offered me a N2 per litre margin for importing PMS, I (and plenty of other people) would jump at it. On a 20 million litre cargo of PMS, that's N40m!!

Please note that if you cut the importers margin from N15 to N2, we save N13 per litre. Daily consumption of PMS is put at 30 million litres, so that would be a N390 million saving per day X 365 days = N142 billion per annum. OR we could remove N13 from the N65 pump price and pay N52 per litre for fuel

6- National Security. If you implement a policy that will inflict serious hardship on the majority of Nigerians (the poor are the majority, and it is the poor that will find it the most difficult to accommodate a higher fuel price and related inflation), there is the risk of popular uprising, higher unemployment and rising levels of crime.

7- Lack of trust for Government. "The money we save will be used for development of the nation, so Nigerians will benefit in the end". Has GEJ come up with a plan for what he will do with the subsidy saving? Do you really trust that Government will spend the subsidy savings on meaningfully developing our country by providing roads, electricity, security etc? Remember that the FG is PDP. What have they done in the past, i.e. 1999 - 2011? All the trillions they have spent so far, where are the results?? Is it that for the past 12 years, the nation has not moved forward solely because the FG has been paying fuel subsidy. Also remember that the subsidy saving will be shared between the three tiers of government. Think about what your Governors and Local Government Chairmen will do with more money (more private jets, Special Advisers, bullet-proof jeeps, foreign trips etc).

8- Refineries are not the issue. Even if we refine all the crude that we extract from the Niger Delta, refinery owners will buy crude at the international price, add cost of production, add their margin and then sell at the international price. So there will be savings compared to imported PMS (freight costs, clearing costs, NPA duties etc), however prices will likely be much higher than N65 per litre (again, correct me if I'm wrong). So if we want cheap fuel, FG would have to sell Nigerian refineries subsidised crude oil.

9- The economy will not collapse if we continue to pay fuel subsidy. If you reduce the cost of subsidy (see 4 and 5), reduce Governments recurrent expenditure, we could even increase capital expenditure.

10- The real reason GEJ wants to remove subsidy is because his political opponents are making money from it! Its a form of Government patronage that he has lost control of (if he ever had control over it in the first place). This reason is purely subjective so bring on the backlash!!

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