By Johnbosco Agbakwuru

As the cost of living continues to go up occasioned by the fuel subsidy removal and floating of the naira, artisans and technicians have appealed to President Bola Tinubu, to do everything possible to salvage the situation. While some lamented that their children had dropped out of school, others said they were finding it difficult to eat one meal a day as they had lost their clients.

An auto mechanic, Solomon Akorshu Ajiir, whose workshop is at Kubwa expressway in Abuja told Saturday Vanguard that he and his family were finding it difficult to eat as customers no longer brought their vehicles for repairs.

Asked how the present economic situation had affected his business, Solomon said, “Definitely, the present economic situation has affected us. For over a week, none of the customers had come to patronize me. Some of my customers have parked their cars and some have started going on bikes. Even the people who are selling spare parts around us are not getting patronage because of the situation. Things are getting harder every day due to the fuel price increase.

I don’t charge my customers a high amount. Most of them are complaining that they can no longer cope with the situation. We have not increased our charges. It is the fuel subsidy removal that has affected so many things, even the food items in the market, and the transporters now complain about fuel every day. I believe if the price of fuel is reduced, most of our customers will start moving around with their vehicles.”

It was the same story for Mr Ndubuisi Nkwado, a Panel Beater who also has his workshop in Kubwa Expressway road. He said: “The economic situation has affected my work so badly. If you look around here, you will see so many vehicles belonging to our customers that have been parked here. Some don’t even have money to buy the spare parts to fix their cars while some of them who have managed to fix it cannot even come and take them as they could not fuel their cars. The price of materials that we use to work has also gone up.

As of last year a kilo of carbide which we used to buy at N500, is now sold for N1,500. Before, we used to weld an exhaust car for N500 and N300 for exhaust silencer, but now we cannot weld the exhaust and ask the customer to pay N2,000 because the cost of carbide alone is N1,500 and we will also buy wedding rod and gas. We cannot even have our daily meal while our children are there at home, they can’t go to school because we can’t afford their school fees.

My only advice to the government is to return the subsidy. The exchange rate of the dollar has gone up. A liter of fuel is almost N1,100, and all these things are caused by the removal of fuel subsidies. If the government can return the fuel subsidy, things will improve. We’re going through hard times”.

On his part, Mr. Joel Lasisi, who just graduated from the University of Abuja, and owns Joel automobile that specialises in auto electrical work said that many artisans and technicians were really going through serious hardships. Joel, popularly known as Wasiu, whose workshop is located at Arab Road Kubwa, said, “Since the increase in price of fuel, we have been finding things difficult because not everybody can afford it.

The high price of fuel has also made the cost of motor spare parts to go higher. Before now you could see about five cars parked here for repairs, here it was always busy but now, the cars are no longer here.”