President Bola Tinubu, has been advised to use N790bn saved from the June FAAC allocation to fix Nigeria’s decadent refineries, increase the salaries of workers and put in place,other measures to cushion the hardship faced by Nigerians over removal of petrol subsidy.
The Federal Government had last week distributed N907.054 billion in revenue to the Federal, State and Local government councils.
The money was part of N1.9 trillion from June’s distributable revenue.
Economic experts said the remainder of N790bn saved by the Federal government, should be immediately used to cushion the harsh effects of the removal of fuel subsidy on Nigerians.
Emmanuel Okwu, President, South East Coalition for Good Governance, SECG, told INNONEWS in Owerri, that this is not the time to save, considering the biting consequences of subsidy removal.
“Savings have never worked in this country.
“When the monies will be frittered away, Nigerians would not know.
“Now that we know that such a humongous amount of money can be saved from FAAC, then it ought to be deployed to repair our refineries.
“We believe that when our refineries work at optimum level, it will force down the price of petrol.
“This would lead to forcing down the prices of goods and services, and reduce the rising cost of living faced by Nigerians” he said.
Mr.Darlington Amadi, an economic expert said though he applauds the Federal Government for saving part of the FAAC allocation, it is imperative it is deployed to absolve the shocks which emanated from the removal of fuel subsidy.
“N790bn can be used to buy buses and distributed to the States, to help ease the cost of transportation.
“It can be deployed to increase salaries of workers and even support operators of Small and Medium Scale Enterprises, who are affected immensely by the subsidy removal” he said.
Mrs. Nkechi Ohanyere, of Centre For Economic and Political Studies, Owerri said savings have never been accounted for, by past administrations in the country.
“Savings have never worked in the country, because most times it is never accounted for. It should be used to alleviate the pains of Nigerians who are going through unbearable hardship presently
“N790bn can be used to get some of our refineries to work. And the sooner those refineries work again, it will substantially reduce the pain of this subsidy removal on Nigerians” she said.
Godfrey Anyagwa, a public policy analyst said there is nothing wrong if government save for the rainy day.
He however added that deploying such funds to build infrastructure may not be appreciated by the citizens at a time they need urgent and immediate shock absorbers over removal of fuel subsidy.
“Infrastructure development is key.But, as it is now, Nigerians need more of policies that would remove the shocks which came about, because of feul subsidy removal.
“We need instant remedy and N790bn would go a long way to deal with this biting issue” he said