NNPP candidate urges Nigerian government to invest beyond fuel subsidy debate

Suleiman Dikwa, the New Nigeria People’s Party’s presidential candidate, says Nigeria is trapped in a debate that treats fuel subsidies and subsidy removal as competing solutions to deeper economic problems.

In a statement titled “Beyond the Subsidy Trap: Why the Atiku-Tinubu Debate Fails Nigeria’s Economic Future,” Dikwa described President Bola Tinubu’s position on subsidy removal and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s proposal for a redesigned subsidy as “two sides of the same bankrupt coin.” He argued that neither approach would solve the country’s structural weaknesses.

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Two sides of the same bankrupt coin.

Dikwa said petrol subsidies had served for about four decades as a substitute for failures in power, transport and logistics. In his view, the question is not whether public money should be spent, but what that spending should create. He called for investment that generates jobs, foreign exchange and productive assets.

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Nigerians on the other hand are not debating whether to spend public money. It is debating what public money should create.

He identified agricultural pre- and post-harvest waste, food imports and ineffective use of donor funds as major problems. Dikwa cited more than 12 trillion naira reportedly lost each year through agricultural wastage, along with foreign exchange spent on food that could be produced locally. He also criticised donor funding that had not produced self-sustaining industrial infrastructure.

Dikwa argued that successful industrial economies have used targeted state support rather than relying on passive laissez-faire policies. He pointed to United States agricultural programmes, China’s state co-investment in electric-vehicle batteries, mineral refining and manufacturing, and European Union support as examples of intervention designed to strengthen domestic production and supply chains.

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No functional industrial power in modern history developed through pure laissez-faire passivity or consumptive cash burn, rather, they deploy targeted subsidies to build global dominance, secure supply chains, and protect domestic purchasing power.