BY BEN AGANDE

ABUJA –   Following the removal of subsidy on Petroleum products by the federal government, the House of Representatives has  indicated intention to scrap the Petroleum Products Pricing and Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) because its continued existence was no longer necessary.

In an interview in Abuja, the Deputy Minority Leader, Hon. Suleiman Kawu Sumaila (ANPP, Kano) who said he would sponsor a bill as soon as the House reconvenes next week revealed that already, over two hundred out of the three hundred and sixty members of the House of Representatives have indicated support for the bill.

According to him, since the PPPRA came into existence through an Act of the National Assembly, it was time for the Act to be repealed ‘in order to save Nigerians from the agonies created by this monster agency.

” I am sponsoring a bill which will seek to repeal the PPPRA establishment Act or in the alternative amend the section which gives it the unilateral powers to increase prices of petroleum products.

“We have obtained the consent of over 200 members of the House who have endorsed the move and we are also talking to the Senate so as to give it a concurrence as soon as we passed it because we will give the bill an accelerated passage” he said.

Speaking on the removal of the fuel subsidy, Hon. Kawu said since the “the powers of appropriation is constitutionally vested in the National Assembly, we will bring back the subsidy allocation’.

He said action of the president amount announcing the withdrawal of subsidy of petroleum products amounted to violation of the law since the two chambers have extended the life span of the 2011 capital budget to March 31st 2012 and subsidy fund is part of the 2011 capital budget.