Following the removal of subsidy on PMS on January 1, 2012 by the Federal Government of Nigeria and the attendant spontaneous social and political upheavals that greeted the policy, the House of Representatives in an emergency session on January 8, 2012 set up an Ad-hoc Committee to verify and determine the actual subsidy requirements and monitor the implementation of the subsidy regime in Nigeria.
The Federal Government had informed the nation of its inability to continue to pump endless amount of money into the seemingly bottomless pit that was referred to as petroleum products subsidy. It explained that the annual subsidy payment was huge, endless and unsustainable. Nigerians were led to believe that the colossal payments made were solely on PMS and HHK actually consumed by Nigerians. Government ascribed the quoted figures to upsurge in international crude price, high exchange rate, smuggling, increase in population and vehicles, etc.
However, a large section of the population faulted the premise of the Government subsidy figures, maintaining that unbridled corruption and an inefficient and wasteful process accounted for a large part of the payments. To avert a clear and present danger of descent into lawlessness, the leadership of the House of Representatives took the bold and decisive action of convening the first ever Emergency Session on a Sunday (January 8, 2012), and set up the Ad-hoc Committee to verify the actual subsidy requirements of the country.
The Committee decided that the scope of this investigation should be for three years 2009 -2011 for the following reasons:
• The actual budget expendfture on subsidy for both PMS and HHK was tolerable, being N261.1 b in 2006, N278.8b in 2007 and N346.7b in 2008. 5 companies including NNPC were involved iQ 2006, 10 in 2007 and 19 in 2008 contrasted to 140 in 2011.
Read More...
No comments:
Post a Comment