Fuel subsidy removal: SERAP begs UN Human Rights Council to intervene
Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has sent a passionate appeal to the UN Human Rights Council urging it to “act urgently to stop the Nigerian government from implementing its unlawful policy of removal of fuel subsidy.”
The organization also urged the Council “to consider the removal of fuel subsidy as amounting to violation of the country’s international human rights obligations.”
The petition dated 3 January 2012 was brought under the Human Rights Council Complaint Procedure, and signed by SERAP Executive Director Adetokunbo Mumuni.
The petition was copied to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms Navanethem Pillay; current president of the Human Rights Council, Ms Laura Dupuy Lasserre; and Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Ms. María Magdalena Sepúlveda.
In the urgent appeal the organization said that, “the withdrawal of fuel subsidy at a time when ordinary Nigerian workers are grossly underpaid and facing extreme poverty will perpetuate inequality and hurt the poor disproportionately by denying this group access to basic necessities of life, such as essential foodstuffs, essential primary health care, basic shelter and housing, and the most basic forms of education.”
- The fuel subsidy protest in Lagos, recently.
The organization also said that, “it is the uncontrolled corruption and not fuel subsidy that has continued to slow down sustainable development and economic growth, and in turn putting at risk the stability and security of the country.”
“Specifically, the government has failed to establish effective and sufficiently independent mechanisms and processes to address and tackle widespread and systemic corruption in the petroleum sector; and therefore violated its obligations to respect, protect, promote and fulfil the citizens’ human rights,” the organization added.
The organization also contended that “the unreasonable removal of fuel subsidy by the government is discriminatory, and cannot be fully justified by reference to the totality of the human rights provided for under international law, and in the context of the full use of the country’s maximum available resources.”
“The policy of fuel subsidy removal has provoked hyper-inflation of prices in the consumer products market and therefore exacerbated the worsening level of poverty in the country, inevitably leading to violations of the citizens’ internationally recognized economic, social and cultural rights,” the organization further argued.
The organization also said that, “The removal of fuel subsidy did not follow due process of law as it was done without full consultations with the affected people and communities. Also, the decision was arbitrary having not been made by the PPPRA Board, contrary to the requirements under the PPPRA Act.”
According to the organization, “Under international human rights law, Nigeria is required to demonstrate that, in aggregate, the measures being taken are sufficient to realize the citizens’ economic and social rights.
Similarly, Nigeria has a legal obligation ‘to achieve progressively’ economic and social rights of the citizens. When read together with the obligation to use the maximum available resources, this obligation ‘to achieve progressively’ means the country is required to ensure the effective use of its resources available.”