How Subsidy Removal Turned Abuja Civil Servants to Commercial Drivers By Idris Umar Feta
POLITICS DIGEST- Since the pronouncement of fuel subsidy removal, the prices of every item in the country, from sachet water to processed goods and even vegetables cultivated on open spaces in the country, have gone up astronomically, making life difficult.
In order to swim with and survive the tide occasioned by the subsidy removal, civil servants with ‘private vehicles’ have turned their cars to commercial ones and themselves commercial drivers.
In the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, many civil servants who preferred to move without company now pick companions from different axis of Suleja, Gwagwalada, and others to Federal Secretariat among other locations in the city center, depending on their destination.
Furthermore, every bus stop in the FCT is packed with supposedly private vehicles, hoping to pick commuters in effort to reduce cost of buying fuel from their renumerations.
Indeed times have changed. We have only seen in foreign countries exotic cars used as taxes or for commercial purposes, but the recent happening in the country has obviously changed the narrative with any posh car you can name being commercialised.
A visit to some ministries in the FCT shows most of their car parks empty because many who could not commercialise theirs have opted to stop coming to work with their vehicles. Junior Staff are most especially grounded in this regard.
One of the civil servants turned commercial driver said, “I am not a full-time commercial driver, I won’t call myself a commercial driver because it’s not my full-time job, I only do this to fuel my car. Instead of me to drive alone in my, car burning the same amount of fuel, why not monetize my trip by picking up passengers? This way my spending on fuel will not come from my salary. The only expenses will be my regular car maintenance.”
A lady who has also chosen to use her vehicle to carry passengers en route to office expressed her reason saying, “it has really given me some relief, though the money won’t cover my daily fuel consumption, it has to some extent reduce the burden.”
“The high cost of fuel has made me limit my movements. I use public transport when going to work while I use my car on Sundays to take my family to church. I don’t want to expose my family to the dangers of climbing bikes or Keke. The moment I come back from church, I park the car,” another civil servant, said as the economic hardship bites harder.
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Lamenting the fuel subsidy removal Mrs. Chinwe Chuka, a staff of the Federal Ministry of Education said, “I used to buy fuel worth N5,000 per week before and now same quantity is over N15,000, where can get N60,000 to fuel my car in a month? Honestly I have to find another way of generating money to buy fuel.”
“I only use my car for going to work and church. I hardly move around with my car because there is no way I will continue using a car when I cannot fuel it,” another worker disclosed.
At some Federal Ministries in the FCT, fewer persons turn up for work on daily basis since the effect of the fuel subsidy removal continues to bite.
It was learnt that some sort of verbal agreement was reached among workers, perhaps, with the approval of their supervisors, to skip some days due to the hike in the cost of transportation and other services.
Confirming this on the condition of anonymity, a staff of one of the ministries said some departments have worked out “clean” arrangements among the themselves on which days to show up in the office.
“Though there was no memo from the Office of Head of Service of the Federation to the effect that workers should skip days. However, there was such agreement among staff within departments. It was done meticulously in manner which would not compromise anyone since, there was no official circular to support the arrangement.
“Most importantly, these arrangements within departments were made in such a way that the official work would not suffer. So far, the arrangement has been working well, and nobody can feel the low turnout of staff.”
Although public service staff across Nigeria work five days a week, of recent, Edo and Kwara states governments’ have reduced working days to three, the move is to help them cope with increased petrol costs, following the federal government announcement to scrap fuel subsidies.
Also recently, the Federal Government approved N5 billion for each state and the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, to enable them to procure food items for distribution to the poor in their respective states.
However, the Federal Government must look beyond sharing money and food items as palliative measures to cushion the effects of subsidy removal, that for all you know may not reach the poor masses the initiative was intended for.
They can alternatively after careful study, create centers to enlighten, and encourage vehicle owners to opt for converting their cars to run on gas which is proving to be cheaper than fuel.
Buses could also be introduced at strategic places and time to commute people to and from work and maybe, just maybe it will reduce the burden of having to spent good amount on fuel or suffering attached to exorbitant cost of transportation fare.
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