BY OLA AJAYI

IBADAN-MORE Nigerians have condemned the proposed removal of subsidy from petroleum products by the Federal Government, saying the action would spell doom for the country.

Expressing their views at different fora, Senator Lekan Balogun and the Chairman, Transition Monitoring Group, Comrade Mashood Erubami said the proposed removal of subsidy would be counter-productive and further worsen the economic situation in the country.

Balogun, who spoke with newsmen at the weekend, said it was premature for the Federal Government to embark upon such thing noting before the subsidy could be removed; the government should properly educate the people on the policy and make alternative to cushion the effects ready.

“If you look at the actual consumers of the product, I mean the final consumer; it is the man on the street. I think we should stay a little longer. It is premature to do it now. Let Nigerians be warned sufficiently for about a year or two before doing it.

“It is hasty, premature and would cause a lot of hardship if done now. If you are doing it, you must have an alternative provision for the poor that will suffer. Some people think that if you don’t remove it, you are also indirectly subsidizing the rich because those who are paid the subsidy are not the poor.

In his own views, Erubami said the planned action was tantamount to coup d’état on the masses. According to him adding that it was very simplistic and ironic to think the removal of subsidy would prevent some imaginary few unpatriotic Nigerians that have been superintending on oil operations in Nigeria from further benefiting from their nefarious activities.

TMG called on the National Assembly not to be swayed by the blackmail of government lobbyists that the removal would bring more money into the national revenue pool for sharing. It threatened to team up with other civil society groups to resist the planned action.