For over two years, Nigerians have suffered relentless economic changes, resulting in the drowning impact of inflation and depletion of the average citizen’s purchasing power.
Notwithstanding the growing number of extremely poor Nigerians who have emerged from the ashes of these purported reforms, the President Bola Tinubu-led administration appears recklessly determined to implement a 5 per cent surcharge on refined petroleum products from January 2026.
At a time when Nigerians are still reeling from the seismic shocks of subsidy removal, free-fall of the Naira, and rising wave of inflation, to pile on yet another burden is not just tone-deaf, but profoundly recklessly.
The proposed tax, which is embedded in the Nigeria Tax Administration Act signed by Tinubu in June 2025, is being sold as a harmonisation of existing tax provisions.
While government insists it is not a new tax but a consolidation of levies originally tied to road maintenance, the proposed tax policy is rather construed as an act of economic cruelty on the poor.
Finance Minister, Wale Edun, has gone to great lengths to frame it as part of a broader reform that streamlines revenue collection, eliminates overlapping taxes, and strengthens fiscal transparency.
Yet no matter the semantics, the effect will be the same, Nigerians will pay more for fuel, and the ripple effect will be on every corner of the economy.
Already, petrol sells at an average of N950 per litre, a humongous 382 per cent increase since Tinubu took office in May 2023.
For the vast majority of Nigerians who depend on petrol, not only for transportation, but also to power homes and small businesses, any additional cost will have devastating impact.
It is against this backdrop that warnings issued by trade union organisations must be urgently heeded.
The Petroleum Products Retail Outlets Owners Association of Nigeria, PETROAN, has warned that its members may be forced to shut down.
Civil society organisations, opposition parties, and labour groups are united in opposition.
Even former presidential candidate Peter Obi has condemned the policy as “a cruel burden on struggling Nigerians,” asking the question on every lip: when will Nigerians be allowed to breathe?
Government, however, argues that the surcharge will boost non-oil revenue and promote fiscal sustainability, but revenue generation cannot be pursued in isolation from social realities.
Nigerians already devote a disproportionate share of their incomes to energy; many households, unable to afford cooking gas or kerosene, have reverted to firewood with dire health and environmental consequences.
Transport fares and food prices, directly tied to fuel prices will further rise. To assume that households or small businesses can simply absorb a fresh levy is fantasising on cruelty.
Stakeholders in the extractive and energy policy space have warned that the move will worsen inflation, cripple productivity, and deepen poverty.
The Joint Action Front, an umbrella body of pro-workers’ civil society groups, has vowed to mobilise nationwide resistance, calling the surcharge “evil and wicked.”
These are not the voices of opposition politics alone; they are the voices of ordinary Nigerians already living on the brink.
Across the world, governments deploy oil wealth to cushion their citizens against hardship, but the Nigerian Government, perversely, weaponises its oil sector against the very people it should uplift.
Instead of using current revenue gains to expand healthcare, improve education, and shore up the naira, the administration celebrates phantom achievements while imposing harsher measures that suffocate the poor.
The opposition ADC has rightly described the policy as cruel and misleading, pointing out the government’s contradictory claims about revenue and borrowing.
To be clear, tax reform is necessary. Nigeria’s revenue-to-GDP ratio is among the lowest in Africa, and fiscal leakages are chronic.
But reforms that ignore compassion will only stoke discontent and derail growth and is at best a punishment on the citizens.
If the government is serious about fiscal sustainability, it should prioritise plugging leakages, expanding the tax net to the wealthy, enforcing compliance in the extractive industries, and cutting the high cost of governance.
What it must not do is balance its books on the backs of citizens already impoverished by inflation and devaluation.
It is therefore our position that the proposed 5 per cent fuel surcharge is indefensible and should not only be suspended, but reviewed and ultimately replaced with a policy that reflects fairness, compassion, and strategic foresight. Nigerians have endured enough.
