These are nuts Buhari must crack
“Waaater, lightii, foooodu, houseee, wetin do them; you mean you no know? I go tell you …” That was the legendary Fela Anikulapo-Kuti in one of his albums in (I guess) the 80s. The thing wey do dem when Fela sang that song still dey do them today. That is whay I laugh whenever they say the National Council of State wants to meet to deliberate on (to use their expression) “how to move Nigeria forward”. Were they not the same people that brought us to our sorry pass? But, can Buhari make the difference? Can he make Fela reverse himself in his grave? Time will tell.
But, if ever there is a time Nigeria should not be having the problem of fuel and light, it is now. The weather is rather harsh. Unfortunately, Nigerians have been living without light and fuel, with the supply of the latter becoming so unpredictable, especially in the last two months. In those days, food, water and shelter were classified as man’s basic needs.
But man’s needs have transcended these basic three. In modern times, fuel and light have also assumed importance. Indeed, in many countries, they are taken for granted. But they have, unfortunately, become issues in a place like Nigeria due to lack of planning, lack of foresight on the part of successive governments, and corruption, especially in high places. All these have been compounded by the docility of Nigerians who have come to accept their fate in the hands of these irresponsible governments with philosophical equanimity.
One particular aspect of the fuel crisis that is disturbing is seeing Nigerians carry generators, sometimes on their heads to filling stations. A caller on Lagos Traffic Radio made a vital point on Thursday during discussion on the ongoing fuel crisis. He asked if the person who banned sale of petrol in jerry cans has generator that uses petrol. It was a rhetorical (even if instructive) question that I am sure he himself did not expect the presenter of the programme to answer. But the point was well made because banning sale of petrol in jerry cans is not necessarily the issue. Without doubt, many of those buying petrol in jerry cans do so in order to resell at cut-throat prices just a few metres away from the filling station where they bought it.
But many too do so in order to be able to power their generators at home or in their various offices or shops. Now, can we quantify the losses of artisans and people in offices who have been denied both electricity from the national grid and still cannot use their generators because government has banned sale of petrol in jerry cans (even when they are ready to buy the fuel at exorbitant prices)?
We have not even talked about people who require petrol for their generators for relaxation, and more importantly to power their fans, to cushion the harsh effects of the hot weather. In a typical tropical climate like ours, it is no luxury for someone to make arrangement for his private electricity supply for such purposes when public power supply is unreliable. So, after a hectic day’s job, one would still get home to experience the frustration of not being able to power one’s generator because government has banned sale of petrol in jerry cans. It may not be the intention of the government to punish Nigerians by this ban. Unfortunately, that is what it has turned out to be, and that is why I said Nigerians are docile. In some other places, such frustration is enough to make people troop to the streets. Government that has failed in its minimum responsibility of providing fuel has now turned round to impose the maximum punishment on hapless people whose only misfortune is their inability to have good governance all these years. You need to be at the filling stations to hear uncomplimentary comments from people who keep vigil there to buy petrol.
Rather than ban outright sale of petrol in jerry cans, what the government should do is limit the quantity of petrol any individual can buy in jerry cans, at least to make room for some of the other purposes I highlighted. It is not everyone that buys petrol in jerry can that wants to resell. Indeed, petrol attendants know those who buy and resell, and many of them would not hesitate to sell as many jerry cans for those people as they want because they know they would make a lot of money from them. I witnessed one such experience at the Mobil filling station near Pleasure Bus Stop on the Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway on Friday. After waiting to buy fuel from about 5.30 a.m. to past 12 in the afternoon, they did not start selling until around 9.00 a.m. They said they had to wait for their chairman who probably was still snoring at the time many of us had left our beds for his filling station. When they eventually started to sell petrol, they focused on people who came with as many as seven jerry cans of about 25 litres in their car boots and back seats! This was after an ‘alfa’ (I did not know whether he was their employee) had announced to us all on their behalf that they would not sell fuel in jerry cans! This naturally led to self-induced chaos that made them stop selling fuel. I left the place frustrated after waiting in vain on queues that hardly moved.
Moreover, rather than ban sale of petrol in jerry cans, why can’t security agents arrest those who buy and resell at the black market since they do that in the open, if the idea is to discourage the practice, rather than make everyone pay for the sins of an insignificant few?
Yes, the argument that it is dangerous to have fuel in jerry cans is valid, but even when there is no fuel scarcity, people have always bought petrol in jerry cans because they must power their generators either at home or to run their businesses. The best way the government can show concern for the sanctity of lives in the country is by creatively and systematically thinking out of the box to solve the problems of power and energy. No one in his right senses would buy petrol in the black market if there is fuel at the filling stations. It is an eye sore seeing Nigerians carry generators to filling stations on their heads or on ‘okada’ ; indeed, it is a national shame and embarrassment that this is the situation in a major oil producing country.
However, let nothing I have said be misconstrued as blaming the Muhammadu Buhari administration for the mess in the energy and power sectors. Just as I am not in league with especially the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members who are asking the government to perform instead of fishing for excuses in the erstwhile ruling PDP. It is not their fault; that is the kind of thing you see in a country where values have gone to the dogs. Many of these people in a place like China would have been rotting away in their graves. The lucky ones among them would be eating dry beans and maize in the prison by now!
My mission, however, is to let the government know the enormity of the energy and power conundrums. Light and fuel have become to us today what food, water and shelter were in the past. Even the GSM phones to some people are indispensable such that if they forget them at home, they are uncomfortable until they are able to lay their hands on them again. The seeming intractability of the crisis is something that many Nigerians do not find funny. That explains why some of them are beginning to ask, and so early in the day, whether they made the right choice during the last general elections. This is a statement induced by frustration and it is quite natural. It is intolerable that the power system would collapse twice in less than two weeks. If the Buhari government discovers that it was bequeathed a ‘one chance’ power sector, it should do away with it. The solution, as many of us have always argued, is not necessarily about raising tariffs. The government would also do well to realise that neither the scorching heat nor the sleeplessness occasioned by vigil-keeping at petrol stations is a friend of the body. And it should resolve that never again would such a thing repeat itself. No explanations would do, because there is no explanation that can sufficiently comfort the child whose mother was killed by a wolf
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