Against wiser counsel, President Bola Tinubu on Wednesday, October 17, 2023, flagged off what he called the “Renewed Hope” conditional cash transfer as part of his idea of cushioning the effects of the subsidy removal on petrol.

Unlike his earlier proposal in which N8,000 was to be shared among 12 million vulnerable households for six months, the new package aims at reaching 15 million households with N25,000 per month for three months. This adjusted programme is one of the 15 items in the Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, signed between the Federal Government and Organised Labour.

It is very disheartening that Organised Labour lent itself to this corruption-prone cash sharing scheme which in no way cushions the effects of the subsidy removal for about 200 million more Nigerians.

A conditional cash transfer that discriminatorily targets only a tiny subset of society is a wrong strategy to palliate a subsidy removal that affects everybody.

This policy, which has exerted knock-on effects on the prices of goods, especially foodstuff and the value of the naira, is responsible for the crippling of millions of businesses, large and small.

Even the promised procurements of gas-powered mass transit vehicles will not go far enough because the cost of gas has been rising steadily in the past few months.

For instance, 12.5kg of cooking gas, which was N8,000 in May 2023, has risen to N15,000. Those who rushed to convert their vehicles and generators to gas have ended up almost back to square one because of the surging prices of gas.

We fault the cash transfer system in its entirety, based on our experiences with it during the Muhammadu Buhari regime.

No credible social register exists to foster accountability in its disbursement. Just like in the Buhari scheme, much of this Renewed Hope cash transfer scheme will likely end up in the pockets of few, well-connected individuals and politicians.

We insist that in removing the subsidy on refined, imported petrol, we should have ensured that all refineries under construction or repair and the already completed modular refineries, are allocated crude in naira and at subsidised cost.

They will, in turn, refine and supply the domestic market at affordable price. That way, everybody in society will benefit, and so will government.

Sadly, many modular refineries which have been completed remain idle because the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Ltd., NNPCL, has refused to supply them with crude oil.

This is unacceptable. The Company must explain its action to Nigerians. We say no to a discriminatory cash sharing. Teach the people how to fish, do not give them fish.

When we establish a fool-proof social register and the economy can carry the burden of cash transfers, it should be done. Don’t give what belongs to all to a few.

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