The All Progressives Congress has challenged former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar to explain his decision to support the return of fuel subsidy after campaigning for its removal during the 2023 presidential election.

APC National Publicity Secretary, Felix Morka said Atiku’s proposal for a production subsidy was “opaque and inexplicable”, arguing that the former vice-president must explain why his position had changed.

Morka spoke on TVC News’ Beyond the Headlines with Nifemi Oguntoye on Wednesday.

“Now, Atiku Abubakar has since recanted his position and now is telling Nigerians he’s returning that system of fuel subsidy, which he condemned vigorously just a few years ago,” Morka said.

He challenged Atiku to explain the circumstances behind the change in position and, more importantly, identify the source of funding for the proposed subsidy.

“If Atiku Abubakar has decided that his position previously was untenable, then he bears a fundamental responsibility to tell Nigerians why he held that position and why that position has changed,” Morka said.

Atiku, now the presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress for the 2027 election, unveiled his proposed petroleum subsidy framework under the Atiku Economic Recovery Plan (AERP) 2027. He said his administration would not return to the former import-based subsidy regime but would introduce a production subsidy targeted at qualifying Nigerian refineries.

Under the proposal, public and private refineries would be allowed to obtain domestic crude at a preferential price, subject to production, efficiency, transparency and domestic-supply conditions. The former vice president said the arrangement would operate within a predetermined annual fiscal ceiling approved through the national budget.

“My proposal is not to resurrect the old subsidy regime. We will move subsidy from importation to production, from middlemen to Nigerian refineries, and from unverifiable claims to verifiable barrels,” Atiku said in a statement announcing the plan. “The principle is simple: the subsidy will follow the barrel. The cost will be known. The ceiling will be known. The beneficiaries will be known. And, most importantly, the benefit delivered to Nigerians will be measurable”.

Morka, however, maintained that Nigerians should not be promised an easy solution to the economic challenges facing the country. He argued that the debate should be based on economic realities rather than political sentiment, insisting that the removal of subsidy was necessary to prevent the economy from collapsing. He said Nigeria had previously been spending about 93% of its revenues on subsidy payments and debt servicing, leaving the government with little fiscal space to meet other obligations.

During a Facebook Live session, Atiku had said: “I initially did not oppose the removal of the fuel subsidy. But now that it has been removed, where is the money? Where has the subsidy money gone? Has it been used to improve healthcare, education or security?” “If I win the presidential election, I will restore the subsidy. And anyone who stole Nigeria’s subsidy funds must return the money,” he said.

Morka described Atiku’s position as “desperation of the most pitiful kind — an admission he is clueless and out of touch with Nigeria’s economic realities and imperatives of reform”. He also accused the former vice-president of “wilful blindness to transformative progress recorded by the Tinubu administration”.

President Bola Tinubu announced the removal of petrol subsidy in his inaugural address on May 29, 2023, at Eagle Square, Abuja, where he declared: “Subsidy is gone”.