A negative occurrence that has defiled many correctives efforts of the past administration, seems to have a more dreaded hit in this present administration of President Muhammad Buhari. A country that is a major exporter of crude oil to suffer this much from lack of fuel has gone a long way to tell us how weak our policies are and the inability of our government to maintain our existing refineries to functional capacity.
As of today, March 16, 2022, the selling price of fuel is #240.00 per litre when seen against the approved selling price of #163.00. Due to the scarcity of fuel, some buy at the price of#250.00 and above. From the black market vendors, it goes between the range of #350.00 to #450,00 depending on your location.
This surge is mostly traceable to the importation of bad fuel that leads to the destruction of vehicles, the presumed cleaning of storage facilities and untimely importation to cushion the shortfall, another major likely cause is the rise and plunge in the oil price which is our major source of revenue, the excuse is that the enormous pressure on the value of the Naira occasioned by a drop in foreign exchange revenue exacerbates the crisis of Naira devaluation and automatically causes a hike in petrol price. On the current fuel price hike when there is a rise in the price of crude oil (about $96.00 per barrel) what could have triggered a fuel price hike?
When oil price decreases, it affects our trade balance, causes inflation, government revenue and the exchange rate which affects the macroeconomic activity in our country then increases as most of the variables except inflation did not respond to the increase. This impacts negatively on the lives of the citizens because steep fuel price leads to inflation that affects prices of other essential commodities like food, medicines, clothes, transportation etc.
As a nation that has perpetually decided to continue in the system of subjecting her citizens to untold hardship, we can reduce or eliminate this challenge of a fuel price hike if only we can invest in alternatives to fuel usage thereby reducing reliance on road freight; provision of safe, reliable, sustainable, affordable public transport; and provision of safe roads for non-motorised transport.
