Tinubu Approves NNPC’s Request To Pay Petrol Subsidy

President Bola Tinubu has approved the request by the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) to use 2023 dividends to pay petrol subsidy.

The 2023 dividends were supposed to be paid into the federation account, which should be shared among the three tiers of government.

This is coming as the federal government has continued denying the existence of petrol subsidy after President Tinubu announced “subsidy is gone” on his inauguration day on May 29, 2023.

Recall that The Eaglesforesight reported that Minister of Finance, Wale Edun, in an interview, said the gap between the landing cost and what petrol is sold by filling stations is covered by “some organization”.

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According to The Cable, the President also approved the suspension of the payment of 2024 interim dividends to the federation in order to augment NNPC’s cash flow.

“In addition, the national oil company told the president it will be unable to remit taxes and royalties to the federation account for now because of the subsidy payments, which it termed subsidy shortfall/FX differential.

“An NNPC forecast seen by the newspaper showed that the cumulative petrol subsidy bill from August 2023 will hit ₦6.884 trillion by December 2024 — leaving the national oil company unable to remit ₦3.987 trillion in taxes and royalties to the federation account,” the report said.

The report added that “NNPC is expected to pause the payment of interim dividends for eight months this year — from May to December“.