Obidients counter Tinubu’s NNPC petrol discount with Obi’s half-price subsidy plan

From  Adesuwa Tsan, Abuja

The Obidient Movement has faulted President Bola Tinubu’s 30-day petrol discount, restricted to Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) retail stations, insisting that Nigerians need sustained relief from high fuel prices rather than a temporary intervention.

This is just as it disclosed that Peter Obi’s proposed policy of making consumers pay half the reference price of petrol was a more effective way to ameliorate the financial hardship caused by the policy.

The movement’s reaction came after the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, on Thursday announced a proposed N1, 350-per-litre ceiling on petrol’s landing or ex-gantry cost, alongside the discount arrangement under which NNPC Retail would forgo its profit margin and sell petrol at cost for 30 days.

In a statement issued on Friday by its Media and Communications Directorate, signed by Onyeka Dike, the movement questioned the transparency of the government’s petroleum interventions and demanded independently verifiable data on daily petrol consumption, the actual cost of the product and the financial implications of the measures.

It argued that the latest announcement had renewed questions about the government’s claim that fuel subsidy had ended, while Nigerians continued to bear the burden of high petrol prices and rising transportation costs.

“The Obidient Movement believes that Nigerians deserve affordable petrol without the corruption, secrecy and criminality that have characterised the management of fuel subsidy in Nigeria,” the statement read.

It maintained that under an Obi administration, subsidy would be restored through a transparent and verifiable framework designed to make Nigerians pay half the reference price of petrol.

“Under a Peter Obi administration, fuel subsidy will be restored, but not as a vehicle for enriching a privileged cartel at the expense of the Nigerian people,” the group said.

The movement added that the proposed arrangement would ensure that “Nigerians pay half the price of petrol.”

The Obidient Movement, however, questioned the figures underpinning the government’s interventions, contrasting the daily petrol consumption level of about 30-something million litres cited by President Bola Tinubu in September 2024 with the approximately 50 million litres reported by Oyedele in October 2026.