Protest of Buhari’s petrol pump price, electricity tariff increase spreads to Ibadan

The protest of the increase of the pump price pf petrol and electricity tariff simultaneously in the month of September by the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has continued to precipitate agitations and protests across the country. While some actors in civil society and the trade unions are still holding consultations on organizing mass action, some others have taken to the streets to express their anger.

Oshogbo, Osun State, has been an arena of mass protest since the announcement of the new price regimes last week. The protest is spreading to other parts of Nigeria as resentment deepens. Students of tertiary institutions and civil society groups extended the Oshogbo protest to Ibadan, Oyo State on Tuesday.

The students mobilized by the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) and National Association of Polytechnic Students (NAPS), took to the streets of Ibadan resisting the price increase of both petrol and electricity tariff, arguing that the decisions are not in the best interest of Nigerians.

The students displayed placards with different inscriptions conveying their disapproval and discontentment of the price increase. They demanded the Federal Government to rescind the price increased in the interest of Nigerians.

Conducting their procession through Bodija unto the Secretariat in Ibadan, the students had at a press declared: “We say no to fuel hike, we say no to increment in electricity tariff and other increments that affect Nigerian students and the masses.

“We have over 200 polytechnic campuses in Nigeria that are at home and angry that schools are closed.”

The Chairman of Joint Campus Committee of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), Mayowa Opakunle, was gathered to have protested that students are the end-recipient of the increases and particularly, those who are into little businesses to earn a living.

Opakunle was cited to have declared: “We are putting it to the Federal Government to put in place, the total reversal of the electricity tariff bill and the increase in premium motor spirit.

“We students are the end recipients, the majority of us are affected because we do small scale businesses to put ourselves in school and so many things we do to make sure we work and not become hoodlums.”

He threatened that Nigerian students will shut down the economy if the government refuses to totally reverse the price increases urgently.

Opakunle maintained: “They should look into the total reversal of these policies that are against our survival and should consider us first before any action is taken. If eventually nothing is done, then we have a total shutdown of the economy.”