Inherent contradictions in some of the issues relating to the current increase in fuel price from N86.50kobo to N145 were last week, brought to the fore by frontline rights activist, Senator Shehu Sani.
In a statement, Sani had condemned in very strong terms what he perceived as orchestrated campaign of calumny by the federal government against the Nigerian Labor Congress NLC for speaking out the minds of poor Nigerians against the fuel price increase.
Commending the NLC for leading mass protests against fuel price increases in the past, he argued that it would be hypocritical to condemn the labour body for its principled stand on the issue now. “Our quest for justice and equity must not depend on the government or persons in power but must depend upon the matters of principles at hand. Those who stood against increases in the price of petroleum products yesterday and stood for it today have betrayed the very principle which they claim to represent”, he further contended.
Sani’s thesis is quite unassailable. And it is at the heart of the plethora of policy failures that have been the sad tale of governments on these shores over the years. Because of the dangerous politics we play in this country, many very well intentioned policies and programmes of the government have not been allowed to see the light of the day. Most often, criticisms of such policies are based on the quarters they are coming from rather than their larger heuristics for public good.
Thus, it is not strange to find a policy option which attracted trident opposition during one regime being hailed shortly after a change of guards even with the objective conditions remaining the same. That has been the uncanny dilemma thrown up by the recent increase in fuel price by the Buhari regime. Curiously, the prevailing conditions and arguments for such a price regime have remained largely the same.
When in January, 2012, the Jonathan regime came up with an increase of N141 per litre of fuel, hell was let loose. The nation was virtually brought to a standstill as organized labour, opposition political parties and diverse civil society groups mobilized to oppose such increase given the deleterious consequences it was bound to have on the lives of the toiling masses that are usually at the receiving end of such policies.
That government was forced to drop the astronomic price increase despite the weighty arguments on which it had premised the adjustment. Before then, both Jonathan and Obasanjo had variously spoken of the looming danger of a revolution, if no conscious efforts were made to create job for the teeming army of the unemployed.
Jonathan went further to predict that the nation would be broke in the next one and a half years if fuel subsidy was not removed. He justified the removal on the grounds that it will open up vast opportunities for Nigeria’s school leavers and population of unemployed graduates in the new refineries and petrochemical industries that will emerge after deregulation.
He also sought to take responsibility for his action when he said “even if we deregulate and I am shamed; posterity will be there to judge me, that I did the right thing and I will be vindicated when Nigerians start enjoying the benefits of my decision”.
In an article in this column shortly before the price increase of January 2012, this writer had taken up the arguments canvassed by Jonathan to persuade the public to accept the price increase. His prediction of the possibility of a revolution coupled with the financial mess the nation was inevitably heading to, were issues that came under serious focus.
For a man that was rather considered weak to have spoken in such strong terms on the imperative of deregulation, with a promise to embark on a programme of carefully selected social relief interventions to ameliorate its pains, I had argued that the scenario presented a game situation with two options- to deregulate or not to deregulate. And since it was a matter of rational choice, rational calculation, the choice Jonathan should opt for is that which will minimize his losses in the event of the worst outcome. The scenario was that of a choice between going broke with the prospects of a revolution on the one hand if we fail to deregulate and excruciating hardship for the vulnerable population on the other if we deregulate. Given the above, the rational option for Jonathan then was to deregulate. If he deregulated, he would have saved the nation the pains of bankruptcy and revolution. Thereafter, he could sit back and put in place all those social intervention palliatives that will reduce the pains of deregulation.
We then concluded that irrespective of the genuine reservations we had on fuel subsidy removal, Jonathan should be allowed to take responsibility on this singular issue if he is so convinced and rise and fall together with its outcome. These issues have been brought to focus given the furore generated by the recent fuel price increase and the defence of same by persons who hitherto opposed the idea.
Today, the policy has received endorsements even from those who hitherto opposed it. Those who were known to have hailed organized labour for stridently opposing such increases in the past are now either equivocating or inventing subtle way to frustrate extant agitations against the current price increase.
The same arguments are being recycled with nothing new to add. We have now been told by the government that the price increase or subsidy removal is inevitable because the nation is broke; the same prediction Jonathan made out four years ago. Issues like this are not likely to go down well with people of principle. That is the matter the likes of Sani have found difficult to contend with, his political leaning notwithstanding.
He finds it hard to reconcile why the labour body is now being divided just to cripple the momentum of their opposition against the price increase even when the masses will be worse for it. He cannot find sufficient justification why those who stood against the price increase yesterday will today be singing a different tune.
It is an issue of conscience; an issue of morality we must fight hard to justify. And the degree of success made in this direction will be a pointer to some of the systemic dysfunctions that have over the years held this nation down. It is the sincerity or lack of it in the way the political class perceives policies and programmes of a government that may not be in their good books, for whatever reasons.
So at what point should national interest come in? For how long shall we continue to pander to the selfish predilections of a political class that says one thing today and entirely another tomorrow? For how long shall we continue to sacrifice issues of national interest and principles on the altar of some selfish, parochial and ill-defined exigencies?
These were some of the issues that pricked the conscience of Sani. And in this, he is with many. Sani is an apostle of conscience; a man of principle. He is the type of man this nation direly needs. He may not really be against the arguments being put forward to support the current price hike. But his worry is that they are issues that have before now been copiously canvassed and rejected. Why all of a sudden, they have become a matter of popular appeal is what he needs to be convinced of.
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