Tinubu’s aide slams Peter Obi over critique of rising fuel prices

Special Assistant to President Bola Tinubu on Social Media, Dada Olusegun has rebuked the Labour Party’s 2023 presidential candidate, Peter Obi, over his comments on Nigeria’s rising fuel prices.

Olusegun told Obi to stop commenting on issues he does not understand, describing the former governor’s remarks on rising fuel prices as wrong and embarrassing.

Olusegun made the remarks in a post on X on Saturday, responding to a statement by Obi published on Thursday, in which the former Anambra State governor blamed Nigeria’s vulnerability to global oil price shocks on the absence of a strategic petroleum reserve and a lack of government planning.

PUNCH Online reports that Obi had noted that petrol, which sold for less than N1,000 per litre weeks ago, had risen to over N1,200 per litre, while diesel had climbed from below N1,000 to over N1,500 per litre, linking the increases to tensions involving Iran and their effect on global oil prices.

The reason for this is straightforward: most countries, whether they are oil-producing or non-oil-producing, maintain strategic petroleum reserves to cushion against supply or price shocks.

“This means that when there is a disruption in the global oil market, they can release part of these reserves to stabilize supply. However, Nigeria lacks such a buffer, so the impact is felt almost immediately.

“The underlying issue is a lack of planning. Countries that engage in planning create buffers against shocks, while those that do not remain vulnerable to them. The old maxim remains true: when a country fails to plan, it has already planned to fail,” Obi said.

But Olusegun dismissed the position, saying the more immediate driver of rising pump prices was the deregulation of the fuel market following the removal of subsidy by the Tinubu administration, not the absence of a strategic reserve.

“The recent rise in fuel prices in Nigeria is not primarily because the country lacks a strategic petroleum reserve. The more immediate factor is that the fuel market is now largely deregulated following the subsidy removal by the administration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu,” he said.

He explained the mechanics of a deregulated market, saying, “In a deregulated system, petrol prices respond directly to global oil prices, exchange rates, shipping costs, and supply risks.

“So when geopolitical tensions involving Iran push global oil prices upward, countries that rely heavily on imported refined products like Nigeria will inevitably feel the effect at the pump. That is simply how an open market behaves.”

Olusegun also challenged Obi’s characterisation of strategic petroleum reserves, arguing that even countries with large reserves, such as the United States and China, maintain them primarily for supply emergencies such as wars and embargoes, and do not deploy them in response to routine market price movements.

“It is also not accurate to suggest that strategic petroleum reserves are tools used to control everyday pump prices.

“Even countries with very large reserves, such as the United States and China, maintain them primarily for serious supply emergencies, wars, embargoes, or major disruptions to global supply chains.

They are not routinely deployed simply because prices move in the global market,” he said.

Olusegun acknowledged that Nigeria faces deep structural challenges but said the framing of the argument was misleading.

“Nigeria’s real challenge has always been deeper and more structural. For decades, the country has struggled with limited refining capacity and a heavy dependence on imported refined products, despite being one of the world’s major crude oil producers.

“That structural imbalance, combined with exchange rate pressures, has consistently made the country vulnerable to global price movements,” he said.

He argued that reducing the issue to a failure of planning around strategic reserves missed the point entirely.

“So yes, planning matters. But reducing the entire issue to ‘Nigeria failed to plan because it does not have a strategic reserve’ completely misses the broader reality.

“Real planning would involve expanding domestic refining capacity, strengthening supply chains, stabilizing the foreign exchange environment, and maintaining consistent energy policies,” Olusegun said.

He also turned Obi’s own campaign record against him, noting that the former governor had publicly pledged to remove fuel subsidy if elected president in 2023.

“It is worth reminding you that during your presidential campaign, you clearly stated that you would remove fuel subsidy if elected.

“So the same policy framework that now allows prices to reflect market realities is one you publicly supported,” he said.

Olusegun went further to question Obi’s grasp of the subject, saying it was “frankly embarrassing” for a former governor to make sweeping conclusions about a complex global energy market.

“When someone who once held the office of governor begins to make such sweeping conclusions about a complex global energy market, it is frankly embarrassing.

“A former governor should know better than to reduce a multi-layered economic issue to a simplistic talking point,” he said.

He urged Obi to refrain from commenting on issues he did not fully understand, saying the former governor had made a habit of maligning Nigeria.

Sometimes the wiser thing to do is simply sit a conversation out when one does not fully understand how the system works rather than jumping at every opportunity to malign Nigeria, as this has been your modus operandi. It would save both the country and the speaker from unnecessary embarrassment,” Olusegun said