Subsidy Na Subsidy, President Tinubu
By Abidemi Adebamiwa President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, subsidy is subsidy. Your administration says NNPC Retail will give up its profit margin on petrol sales to help ease the hardship Nigerians are facing. It has also…
President Bola Tinubu's removal of the petrol subsidy in May 2023 marked one of the most consequential economic decisions of his administration, triggering a sharp spike in fuel prices and a corresponding rise in transport fares, food costs and general inflation across Nigeria. The policy, long advocated by economists and international lenders as necessary to curb the huge drain on government revenue from subsidising petrol, has remained politically sensitive because of its direct and immediate impact on household budgets.
This commentary questions whether recent moves by NNPC Retail to forgo its profit margin on petrol sales amount to a genuine easing of hardship or simply a rebranded form of subsidy under a different name. The piece, carried by both Daily Trust and Leadership, argues that regardless of the terminology used, any government-directed price relief that reduces revenue or shifts costs elsewhere functions economically like a subsidy — and calls on the Tinubu administration to be transparent about the true cost and sustainability of such interventions rather than presenting them as a break from the subsidy era.