APC Campaign DG Yari Tackles Atiku, Says Fuel Subsidy Promises Are Deceptive
The Director General of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council, Senator Abdul’aziz Abubakar Yari, has dismissed promises by the African Democratic Congress (ADC) presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, to restore the petrol subsidy as unrealistic and insincere.
With Nigeria’s presidential election scheduled for January 2027, Senator Yari cautioned the electorate against political manipulation on Friday, August 29, 2026, while addressing senior officials of the ruling APC.
Yari, a former governor of Zamfara State and former Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), questioned the rationale behind advocating for a policy that lacked any budgetary backing even before the current administration took office. He maintained that when President Bola Tinubu assumed leadership in May 2023, no provisions had been made for fuel subsidy payments.
“Anyone who is deceiving the Nigerian masses by saying, ‘I’m going to bring this thing back,’ is lying to themselves,” the former governor declared.
He further questioned the sincerity of reintroduced proposals for a policy that previously cost the nation roughly N20 trillion annually with little accountability.
Puncturing Atiku’s campaign promise, Yari added: “They are lying internally, lying externally, and lying to Nigerians. This is about N20 trillion per year going where we don’t know. No one can tell you exactly how many litres we need or what the daily quantity is.”
“Before Asiwaju came in 2023, there was no budget for the subsidy. Assuming it was going to continue—if there was even anything to continue after May 29, 2023—the National Assembly passed the budget in March, but there was no provision for it in the 2023 budget. How was it going to run?” he queried.
Reflecting on his tenure as NGF Chairman, Yari noted that the transparency issues surrounding fuel consumption are long-standing. “We challenged the NNPC for four years to state the exact consumption. Nobody knows the number. They propagated the numbers, and we were paying based on those numbers. At the end of the day, when we pushed harder, they said no,” he concluded.
