The former president of the Christian Association of Nigeria and
former Prelate of the Methodist Church of Nigeria, Dr. Sunday
Mbang, has described the government of President Goodluck
Jonathan as ‘heartless’ for removing subsidy on petrol.
Mbang said the Federal Government showed that it did not care
about Nigerians by removing the subsidy when many Nigerians
travelled to their home for the Christmas and New Year festivities.
He urged Nigerians to protest the subsidy removal peacefully.
“I was told a story of one worker in this country who was paid
N5,000 to travel to the eastern part of the country and now she is
asked to pay N18,000 to come back and that is the minimum
wage. When government agreed to pay the N18,000 minimum
wage, did they pay it? People had to go on strike again before
they started thinking of paying it.
“How then do we believe the government?”
Mbang added that government ambushed the people by
announcing the subsidy removal when discussions were still
going on.
“They told us they were doing town hall meetings, did they tell us
the town hall meetings were going to end on December 31? I
listened to Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, she said town hall meetings
were going on and that at the end of the day they would collate
all they get. Have they finished collating? If they have, did they
tell us what the result of what they collated is and what they have
decided? They just clamped down on the people. They don’t even
care about people,” he said.
In a related development, the founder, Kingsway International
Christian Centre, Pastor Matthew Ashimolowo, has warned the
Federal Government against the removal of subsidy from fuel.
He said, “The timing is wrong although subsidy removal is
necessary. The poor are hungry and anybody who is down
already fears no fall. If the poor people turn against the society,
the consequences would be dire.”