FUEL SUBSIDY PROBE: Coalition of Civil Society Groups declare support for House of Representative's decision

A coalition of civil society groups met in Lagos on Sunday, 29th April 2012, to review the House of Representatives report on the fuel subsidy management. After an extensive deliberation, the group resolved in a communique as follows:
 

1.  The civil society groups commend the Farouk Lawan Committee of the House of Representative for a thorough review of the petroleum sector and the fuel subsidy regime.

2. The group expressed satisfaction with positions taken by the House of Representatives on the report of the Farouk Lawan committee.

3. The groups noted that the President has assured Nigerians that all those found culpable in the review report will be prosecuted. It however noted that there was no timeframe given for the promised prosecution of those indicted. Also it noted the failure of the Senate to issue a report on it's own committee hearings and the silence / inactions of the Senate on the House of Representatives'ol resolution.

4. Pursuant to paragraph 13 of the Lawan report's executive summary, the group noted that the four NNPC refineries have installed capacity of 40 million liters per day of PMS, 10 million per day of Kerosine, 8.97 million per day of diesel, 0.62 million per day of LPG and 2.31 million per day of FO. The implication of these is that "with the current refining capacity of 53% and the SWAP/Offshore processing arrangement of the balance of 47%," the NNPC has the capacity to refine 5 million litres per day PMS in excess of the 35 million liters per day required for our daily consumption from the 445,000 barrels per day allocated for domestic consumption.

5. Therefore, it demanded the immediate development of framework for the prosecution of all the people indicted in the report. It as a matter of urgency demand that the appropriated PMS subsidy for the year 2012 be deleted from the 2012 budget by the National Assembly as there is no need for the importation of PMS in the first instance as unravelled by the House of Representatives.

The Communique signed by Olanrewaju Suraju as Convenor, Abiodun Showunmi as Secretary and Victoria Ohaeri as member urged the President and the EFCC to ensure a speedy prosecution of all those involved in the crime against the Nigerian State in order to restore some measure of public confidence in the democratic governance.


Signed:


Olanrewaju Suraju. Victoria Ohaeri. Abiodun Sowunmi
Convenor                   Member                   Secretary