The Federal Government's ₦17.5 trillion debt to the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) has exposed what may be Nigeria's largest fuel subsidy programme despite the official declaration that subsidy was abolished in 2023, Chairman of the Alliance for Economic Research and Ethics Ltd/GTE, Dele Oye, has said.
Oye, a former President of the Nigerian Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA) and immediate past President of the Organised Private Sector of Nigeria (OPSN), argued that the massive liability represents a continuation of fuel subsidy under a different accounting structure, warning that Nigeria is now operating "the most expensive subsidy programme in its history."
According to him, the obligations, accumulated under energy security expenses, under-recovery claims and other receivables, have shifted the cost of petrol subsidies from public budget disclosures to NNPCL's books, raising serious concerns over fiscal transparency and the implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA).
"Nigeria is currently executing the most expensive subsidy programme in its history, yet almost no one is calling it by its true name.
"A ₦17.5 trillion liability has been accumulated in the shadows, hidden behind accounting terminologies designed to obscure rather than illuminate.
"This is not energy security; it is fiscal capture, the systematic transfer of public wealth through mechanisms that evade democratic oversight. The Petroleum Industry Act was designed to dismantle such opaque structures, not to be weaponised to legitimise them.
"Three years after the declaration that 'subsidy is gone', the burden has never been heavier. It has merely been rebranded. And that, tragically, is the most expensive word game in Nigerian history."
Oye said NNPCL's audited 2024 financial statements showed that the Federal Government's obligations to the company had increased from ₦9.36 trillion in 2023 to about ₦17.5 trillion in 2024, comprising ₦7.13 trillion in energy security expenses, ₦8.67 trillion in under-recovery claims and ₦8.84 trillion recorded as other receivables from the federation.
The remarks add fresh pressure on the Federal Government and NNPCL to provide greater clarity on the growing liabilities recorded under energy security expenses and under-recovery claims, as debates over the true status of fuel subsidy continue despite the government's insistence that the policy ended more than three years ago.