Nigerians Can’t Survive Fuel, Electricity Price Hike, PDP Tells Buhari

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said there is no way Nigerians can cope with the hike in the cost of fuel and electricity, as recently announced by the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government.
In a statement by its spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, yesterday, the party described the attempt by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, to justify the excessive hike in the cost of fuel “from N87 per litre under the PDP to N162 as well as electricity from N30.23 per kWh to over N66kw/h, as yet another daring and intolerable affront to the Nigerian citizenry, who have summarily rejected the increases.”
The statement further read: “Our party stands with Nigerians in insisting that there is no way our compatriots can survive a N162 per litre fuel price and a N66 per kW/h of electricity in a country which, in the last five years, ranked as the poverty capital of the world, with a frightening 23 percent unemployment rate; where over 90 million citizens live in abject poverty and many more living on less than N500 a day.
“Indeed, we find it very inconceivable that after the federal government, through the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management and Social Development, Sadiya Farouq, confirmed that 90 million Nigerians are living in poverty, it still went ahead to increase the cost of essential commodities that drive our economy.
“Nigerians are already in trepidation that the excruciating price increase is a sudden death sentence on many citizens, particularly those living below the poverty line, as they cannot survive under a worsened economic situation.
“Moreover, with a N30,000 federal monthly minimum wage, which represents a N1,000 ($2.1) daily wage, there is no way an average Nigerian can survive under the excessive fuel and electricity hike, with attendant increases in transportation and other operational costs, which will leave most citizens with nothing for food, medicines, house rents and other basic necessities of life.
“We remind President Buhari that this hike will worsen the scary situation in the last five years, where compatriots are resorting to suicide, slavery mission abroad as well as selling off their children as options.