Falana Urges Nigerians To Resist Proposed Electricity Tariff Hike
LAGOS JUNE 28TH (NEWSRANGERS)-Femi Falana, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and human rights activist has urged Nigerians to resist the plan by the Federal Government to impose a forty percent hike in electricity tariff, reportedly to start on July 1.
In an interview which was monitored by our correspondent, the rights activist said it was insensitive and callous for the Federal Government to even think of increasing tariff on electricity after what Nigerians are going through following the removal of subsidy on petrol by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Falana said: “Nigerians should resist economic policies that are designed to further inflict economic pains on them. With respect to the proposed electricity tariff, it is insensitive, it is almost wicked. Nigerians are yet to absorb the pains of the removal of the so-called fuel subsidy and the government is planning to increase the electricity tariff, Nigeria is planning to devalue the currency for an import-oriented economy.
“The economic crisis that will be unleashed on the country through the dollarisation of the economy via the devaluation of the currency is high. So for me, we must take all these problems holistically.
“Removal of fuel subsidy, increase in electricity tariff, proposes an increase in school fees, propose an increase in the price of diesel with the adoption of 7.5 percent VAT and so on; and unless we take a holistic analysis of all these, we may not be able to appreciate what Nigerians are meant to go through, meanwhile no government official at the stage of local government, state level and at the federal level is prepared to make any sacrifices.
“When you go around you still see public officials with fleets of cars like twenty, twenty-five or even up to thirty cars following them; we cannot run a system like that. No public official has said he/she is not going to receive security votes in order to cut governance cost; unless people in power are ready to make sacrifices, the masses won’t take them seriously,” he said.
Daily Independent
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Posted by News Rangers
on Jun 28 2023. Filed under National.
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