By Olaotan Falade

This 45minutes, 2 seconds long documentary delved extensively on its focus (Fuel subsidy) leaving no room whatsoever for guess work. From the beautiful opening scene showcasing not just the beauty and bustling nature of Africa’s most populous country but her revered culture and tradition, one can conclude that the documentary will be topnotch.

The super combination of ace broadcast journalist, Femi Sowoolu and veteran actor/voice over wizard, Segun Arinze as voice over artists for this documentary makes it even more tempting to watch repeatedly. I could not help but visualize the crisp, smooth and engaging delivery of both professionals as their bass-filled, yet sonorous voices pierce through the scenes sequentially.

The choice of sounds, visuals and clean data explainer added superb quality, easy-to-assimilate touch to the documentary.

How does one even expect less of a quality from a fuel subsidy-focused documentary executively produced by Depot and Petroleum Products Marketers Association of Nigeria (DAPPMAN) themselves?

I carefully watched as the camera spotlights on all DAPPMAN members starting with Dame Winifred Akpani, Founder & Chief Executive Officer of NorthWest Petroleum and Gas Company. Akpani who doubles as Chairman of DAPPMAN explained in details the ‘genesis’ of fuel subsidy in Nigeria. She later passed the baton to Mahmud Tukur, second Vice Chairman of DAPPMAN and former Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of Eternal Oil & Gas PLC who also spoke about how fuel subsidy has been around for so long that Nigerians got used to it as normal.

The Group Chief Operating Officer of MRS Holdings and First Vice Chairman of DAPPMAN, Amina Maina also went down memory lane on how fuel subsidy was introduced, expansion in membership of the committee from three to over 100 and how it became corruption riddled over time.

Chief Executive Officer, Pinnacle Oil & Gas Ltd, Bob Dickerman described subsidy as a form of price manipulation, double-edged sword that most times kills morale of industry players.
The Executive Director, Financial Strategy, SAHARA GROUP, Moroti Adedoyin Adeyinka explained that the problem was not with subsidy itself but its abuse. She said it became an issue when Nigeria started subsiding economies of surrounding countries.

The Group Managing Director of Rain Oil Ltd, Gabriel Ogbechie in his input said amount spent subsiding when the daily fuel consumption in 2009 stood at 30 million litres is not same as daily consumption figures of 80 million of today.

The Chief Executive Officer of Mainland Oil and Gas Ltd, Chris Igwe in his submission said some ‘bad’ eggs with and outside government are responsible for the corruption in the subsidy regime and government cannot continue to throw free money at such few at the expense of the millions others who are in dire need and daily shortchanged.

For Managing Director of Swift Oil and Gas Ltd, Stilian Mitakev, fuel smuggling from Nigeria to neighbouring countries still exists. And this makes it even more worrisome because the spiral effect on the average Nigerian will be too enormous to bear.

The documentary also lived up to its expectation of not only informing and enlightening in simple lay man language on the subject matter but also dismantling some age long erroneous impressions about it, especially that of marketers being the sole beneficiaries of the whole subsidy regime.

In all the foregoing, one very key thing I observed as the DAPPMAN members make their submissions was the perfectly laced scenes of loading bay, sales and production activities at their respective tank farms and filling stations. Worthy of mention as well is the equal representation of other DAPPMAN members whose MD/CEOs did not speak in the documentary.

Despite being produced by DAPPMAN, the documentary also aired opinions of the Nigerians who are directly hit by effect of fuel subsidy removal from day one of President Bola Tinubu’s administration. While they expressed their reservations for the ‘impromptu’ removal without recourse to shock absorbers, however, they are particularly hopefully that if monies saved are properly channeled, the challenges faced today will be short lived.

The documentary did not end without a message from DAPPMAN members to Nigerians to exercise more patient as gains of subsidy removal builds up and government to properly channel improved revenue to appropriate areas that will ease the burden of Nigerians who have had to bear the pains of the subsidy removal.

As I round up, I have to specially commend the intellectual prowess of ace journalist and marketing communication expert, Ademola Adedoyin and legendary film maker and producer, Zik-Zulu Okafor whose combined efforts made what would have appeared an oil and gas jargon documentary one of the easiest to understand without losing essential technicalities.