Now that Tinubu and Atiku agree on cheap petrol

Last week, I argued that Atiku Abubakar’s promise to restore petrol subsidy had rattled President Bola Ahmed Tinubu because it finally opened a policy flank on which the president is acutely vulnerable. Events since then have strengthened my conviction. Tinubu has gone from deriding Atiku’s proposal as evidence of “serious ignorance” of governance and economics to suddenly talking about the imperative to lower transportation costs and make Nigerians benefit from cheaper fuel.

After meeting governors this week, Tinubu announced an accelerated rollout of CNG infrastructure and said, “We have agreed that cheaper fuel should result in cheaper fares!” His government wants lower transport fares from October 1.

Atiku wants to achieve affordability through petrol subsidy. Tinubu wants to achieve it through CNG and state intervention in transport fares. Beneath the differences in method lies an unexpected convergence: both men now concede that Nigerians need affordable energy and transportation. That’s some progress!

Tinubu once knew this without the benefit of Atiku’s prompting. At his January 25, 2023, presidential campaign rally in Abeokuta, he said, “I will reduce the price of fuel. Be rest assured that I will solve the fuel crisis.” He later repeated the promise more tersely: “We shall bring the fuel price down.” Those are useful quotations to recall now that the government treats cheap petrol as an economic abomination.

The difference between candidate Tinubu and President Tinubu is that the latter became captive to the narrative hegemony of subsidy-removal fundamentalists. Because Atiku and Peter Obi had also promised to eliminate petrol subsidy in 2023, there was no formidable 
 political voice challenging the ideological consensus. The victims of the policy complained, but the political elite and their neoliberal cheerleaders told them that their suffering was necessary, temporary and ultimately redemptive.

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