Falana charges FG to come clean on pump price increment.
By Steve Ovirih.
Human rights Lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Chief Femi Falana has knocked Federal Government over its shoddiness in the management of the inconsistency in the pump price of fuel in the past few months. The fiery lawyer who was responding on a National Television programme monitored by the polity.net noted that while government on one hand has assured that there is adequate fuel to go round consumers across Nigeria, it has in the same breath, speaking through the minister of state for Petroleum, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, insinuated that fuel supply chain is being hampered by activities of smugglers , hence government cannot guarantee a pump price that will not experience a surge.
Falana said Federal government cannot talk from both sides of the mouth, approbating and reprobating on the same topic that affects virtually all Nigerians.
It will be recalled that queues have returned to filling stations in major states of Nigeria due to the inadequate and lopsided supply of the premium motor spirit by concerned authorities to retail outlets.
Chief Femi Falana called the attention of Federal Government to the fact that a huge contract sum in the neighbourhood of 17 billion Naira had been approved to take care of tracking and surveillance of crude oil to avert oil theft, stressing that if upon all these efforts , government can still finger oil theft as reason for fuel inadequacy, it reflects the high level of tardiness of government on the collective welfare of Nigerians.
He equally noted that what our government has indicated , if we have to pay more because of crude theft, is that Nigerians are to be collectively held responsible for the criminal atrocities of a few , who are stealing our oil under the nose of federal government that was put in place to protect the economy against both internal and external aggression of saboteurs .
He said it should be embarrassing enough that in Nigeria there is no stable pump price of fuel and quality man hour is being wasted at filling stations as the queue has gradually surfaced again.
Femi Falana counselled government to be bold about its attempt to fix pump price rather than stifling the masses with fuel scarcity, the effect of which is an everyday increase in pump price, adding that the present administration is failing in its responsibility to understand the essence of adequate fuel supply to Nigerians.
