Rabiu Kwankwaso, the vice presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress, reopened one of the most contentious debates in Nigerian politics this week when he declared that the removal of fuel subsidy was a mistake and that his party would restore it in a different form if elected in 2027.
Speaking during an interview on Arise News, the former governor of Kano State argued that Nigerians deserved access to affordable petroleum products and criticised the manner in which President Bola Tinubu implemented the policy in May 2023. He said the decision was taken abruptly, without adequate measures to cushion its effects, and insisted that the NDC would expand refining capacity through public and private investment in order to bring down the price of fuel.
His intervention came only weeks after Atiku Abubakar, the former vice president and presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress, made a comparable pledge. Atiku said he would introduce what he described as a transparent production subsidy for petroleum products refined within Nigeria, arguing that the current administration had failed to account for the financial gains of the policy it implemented three years ago.
It is a striking reversal for a man who supported the removal of subsidy before the 2023 general election. The Presidency has described his new position as a volte-face, while the All Progressives Congress dismissed it as desperation for power.
Those characterisations may be politically convenient, but they do not address the substance of what Atiku is now saying, nor do they explain why so many Nigerians appear willing to listen.
The history of this debate makes the current posturing difficult to take seriously. In 2011, Muhammadu Buhari campaigned for the presidency on a promise to end fuel subsidy, describing it as a fraudulent arrangement and vowing to bring down the cost of petrol. During the eight years he spent in office, subsidy payments reached their highest levels in Nigeria’s history, with estimates placing the total at approximately $25 billion. Fuel prices rose by more than one hundred per cent under his administration.
In January 2012, Bola Tinubu, then an opposition leader, issued a strongly worded statement condemning President Goodluck Jonathan’s attempt to remove subsidy, accusing the government of breaking its social contract with the people and tossing citizens into hardship. Eleven years later, as president, Tinubu removed the subsidy on his first day in office. The people now attacking Atiku for changing his position are the same people who changed theirs when circumstances suited them.
What this tells us is that fuel subsidy has never been treated as a matter of economic policy in Nigeria. It has been treated as a matter of political convenience. Every major contender in the last four election cycles has adjusted his position on the issue depending on whether he was seeking power or holding it. Atiku is not an exception. He is simply the latest participant in a game that has been played for more than a decade. What makes his current position significant is not that it is new, but that it resonates. Nigerians are tired. They are tired of petrol priced beyond their reach, of transport fares that consume a worker’s entire monthly earnings, and of a government that insists the savings from subsidy removal are being applied to public goods while hospitals, schools and roads remain in a state of disrepair.
Kwankwaso belongs to a party whose presidential candidate holds a different view. Peter Obi, the NDC presidential candidate, has stated repeatedly and in unambiguous terms that subsidy must be removed. At the Nigerian Bar Association conference in August, he said he subscribed to the position that subsidy should go, and that the mismanagement of the proceeds should not be used as an excuse to retain it. Yet his own running mate is now promising to bring it back. The contradiction is difficult to ignore, and it raises a legitimate question about what the NDC actually stands for.
There are two ways to interpret this. The first is that Kwankwaso’s proposed subsidy is not a return to the old regime of paying importers the difference, but a refining policy designed to make fuel cheaper by producing it domestically. On that reading, there is no real conflict between his position and Obi’s. The second interpretation is less charitable. Obi has built a reputation on holding positions that are unpopular but which he presents as principled. He cannot easily campaign on a promise to restore subsidy without undermining that reputation. Nor can he afford to ignore the anger of Nigerians who are struggling. Allowing Kwankwaso to test the waters is a low risk strategy. If the promise is well received, Obi can adjust his position without appearing to have done so. If it provokes criticism, he can maintain that his own view has not changed. Either way, his hands remain clean.
We cannot know what was discussed within the NDC before Kwankwaso spoke. What we can observe is the effect. Fuel subsidy, which ought to be debated on its economic merits, is being drawn into the realm of campaign strategy. The timing is instructive. The 2027 general election is still some distance away, but the groundwork is already being laid. Atiku has made his position clear. Kwankwaso has now made his. Obi has remained silent while his running mate speaks. The three of them are offering Nigerians three different positions on the same issue, and none has published a costed plan setting out where the money will come from, what the price of fuel will be, or how the corruption that made the old subsidy indefensible will be prevented.
The administration of President Tinubu, for its part, has not helped its own case. When the subsidy was removed in 2023, the argument was that the savings would be directed towards infrastructure, education and healthcare. More than three years later, those savings have not translated into visible improvements in the lives of ordinary Nigerians. Revenue to the federation account has increased substantially, and allocations to state governments have risen from four point eight four trillion naira in 2022 to fifteen point five three trillion naira in 2025, according to figures compiled by BudgIT. Yet many states continue to spend these funds on salaries, allowances and appointments that serve no purpose beyond political patronage. Nigerians are entitled to ask where the gains of subsidy removal have gone.
That is the question Atiku is asking, and it is a question that deserves an answer. The problem is that asking the question is not the same as providing a solution. Atiku has promised a production subsidy. Kwankwaso has promised a subsidy in a different form. Neither has explained what that means in practice. Neither has said how much it will cost, how it will be funded, or how it will be structured to avoid the abuses that characterised the previous regime.
If the NDC has a genuine plan, it should publish it. If Obi stands by the removal of subsidy, he should say so clearly and explain why his running mate has said something different. If Atiku means what he now says, he should explain why he held the opposite view three years ago. And if the Tinubu administration wants to defend its reform, it should show Nigerians what the money has bought.
What the country is receiving instead is noise from every direction.
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