Atiku Faults Lokpobiri’s Claim That Petrol Is Cheaper In Nigeria Than US

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has criticised the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Heineken Lokpobiri, over his comparison of petrol prices in Nigeria and the United States.

Lokpobiri had said Nigerians were paying less for petrol than Americans, arguing that the price of the commodity was currently higher in the US despite the country being one of the world’s largest crude oil producers with several refineries.

“Our (petrol) price is lower than that of the US. The United States is the highest producer of crude oil and one of the countries with the highest level of refineries. Today, the price in the US is higher than that of Nigeria,” he said during an appearance on Channels Television.

Reacting through his media aide, Paul Ibe, Atiku said the comparison failed to account for the difference in earnings and purchasing power between workers in both countries.

Ibe argued that the affordability of petrol could not be determined by comparing the price of a litre alone without considering how much workers earn.

“Telling a Nigerian earning ₦70,000 a month that petrol is cheaper because an American pays a higher dollar price per litre ignores the question that actually matters: how much petrol can each worker afford from their earnings?” he said.

According to him, at a pump price of about ₦1,400 per litre, a worker earning ₦70,000 monthly could afford roughly 50 litres of petrol.

He compared this with the purchasing capacity of a worker earning the US federal minimum wage, claiming that four weeks of such earnings could buy approximately 981 litres of petrol at prevailing US pump prices.

Ibe said the more meaningful comparison should therefore be the proportion of income workers spend on petrol rather than the nominal price per litre.

He also argued that high petrol prices in Nigeria have wider effects because of the country’s reliance on road transportation and petrol-powered generators.

“Because Nigeria depends heavily on road transportation and generators, expensive petrol does not stop at the filling station. It feeds directly into the price of food, transportation, production and virtually every other household expense,” he said.

Ibe added that Nigerian households were also dealing with rising costs of food, rent, electricity, transportation and healthcare, alongside the loss of purchasing power of the naira.

He questioned whether the average Nigerian household was better off under the current economic conditions and called on the government to provide broader economic data when defending its record.

According to him, such data should include petrol costs as a share of wages, real household income, food inflation, transport costs, unemployment, poverty and purchasing power.

“Affordability is measured against income, purchasing power and the cost of living. Any comparison that leaves those out is economically incomplete,” Ibe said.

He added that Nigerians deserved economic arguments based on what households could actually afford rather than international pump-price comparisons that ignored differences in wages and living costs.

Ibe described such comparisons as “Animal Farm” figures and urged the government to base its assessment of the economy on broader cost-of-living indicators.

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