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B N W: Biafra Nigeria World News |
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NUC ex-scribe blames fuel price increase on external forces
ERSTWHILE Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Prof Munzali Jibril, has joined the stream of well-meaning Nigerians opposed to the sudden increase in the prices of petroleum products.
Jibril, in an interview with The Guardian in Kano, noted that the increase was one of the measures designed by the Breton Woods Institutions and adopted by government to visit severe hardship on Nigerians.
Stressing that there was no rationale for the price hike, he maintained that the measure would translate to more hardship for Nigerians and the tendency for corruption to thrive among those he called "the ruling elite" in the polity.
Jibril, who teaches at the Bayero University, Kano (BUK), also warned that the worst was yet to come as Nigerians should expect further increase in the prices of petroleum products and a fall in the value of the naira.
He stated: "It does not make sense for our national currency to be debased and undervalued through reckless economic mismanagement by our leaders past and present, and then for this low value to be used by the Breton Wood Institutions as the basis for determining the domestic price of a God-given, national, natural resources such as petrol.
"At this rate, perhaps we shall be paying N200 per litre of petrol before year 2005 runs out"
He also bared his mind on other reformatory programmes of the government, which cut across Labour, corrupt practices and the due process principle.
Jubril dismissed the anti-corruption campaign as a smokescreen aimed at blindfolding the people into thinking that the government was serious about tackling the menace.
According to him, there are more corrupt practices now than before.
He maintained that the current anti-corruption drive appeared to be used only to intimidate opponents of the government "or friends who are being whipped into line and once the purpose has been achieved, the case is withdrawn."
The university don said the Labour Reform Bill was meant to emasculate the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) which has been opposing unpopular government policies.
His words: "When the Labour bill is signed into law, not even the NLC can defy the police and hold a strike or protest rally against unpopular policy. This appears to be a prelude to the creation of a police state which in turn would be a prelude to the perpetuation of a one-man life Presidency."
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