“We have come to tell the President that we don’t need the N8,000 palliatives. He should keep it to himself. It is another way of stealing Nigerians’ money. How do you get the statistics of 12 million Nigerians that you want to pay N996bn to as palliatives? Meanwhile, you want to spend N70bn on the National Assembly, which has just 469 members.’’
“Is that not stealing? Is that not calling Nigerians fools? We want to let President Bola Tinubu know that we are not fools and that enough is enough,” Enabulele added.
Speaking also, the President of Talakawa’s Parliament, Kola Edokpayi, said, “It is no longer news that the poverty rate has increased under the watch of our president. It is sad we are where we are today. We cannot continue like this. Imagine lawmakers proposing N70bn payment when the masses are suffering.”
Responding to the demands of the protesters, the Special Adviser to the Edo State Governor on Media Projects, Crusoe Osagie, said that the Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki, could not determine the fuel pump price in the state and urged the citizens to hold the Federal Government responsible for the hardship faced by the people.
But expressing concern over the planned rollout of palliatives by the states to cushion the subsidy removal, the Trade Union Congress said it did trust state governors to manage the process well.
