Subsidy Removal: FG Targets 1m Gas-powered Vehicles by 2027

James Emejo in Abuja

The federal government has unveiled plan to deliver one million Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) vehicles by 2027.
The move seeks to promote the use of CNG as an alternative to petrol, following the removal of petrol subsidy which had brought hardship on Nigerians.
The plan was disclosed by the Programme Director, Presidential CNG Initiative, Mr. Micheal Oluwagbemi, at a stakeholders’ meeting held at the weekend.
The meeting was to formalise partnership with the Nigerian Institute of Transport Technology (NITT), FEMADEC Group, among others, aimed at catalysing sustainable transportation in the country.

He said the government intended to establish 1,000 conversion workshops across the country, stressing that the initiative would provide over 50,000 jobs as well as cushion the impact of subsidy removal.
He said, “We have a goal, one million vehicles by the year 2027 and that allows Nigeria to save about $20 billion in 10 years and also allows us to manage transport inflation.”

He explained that there was ongoing plan to launch 55,000 CNG conversion kits for existing PMS-dependent vehicles within the timeframe specified by President Bola Tinubu.
Oluwagbemi said, “Our goal in the presidential CNG initiative, as stated by the President in his October 1 speech is to make 55,000 conversion kits immediately available to the Nigerian public so that we can begin to jumpstart the CNG revolution.
“The palliative program as described by the president is on July 31 speech is here until March 31 of 2024. So, technically speaking, we are expected to roll out 55, 000 within that time frame.

“Given of course naturally, we are quite a bit constrained when it comes to the number of workshops and there’s a reason why we’re here today. We only have seven functional workshops in the country. In our estimate, we need about 1000 to be able to achieve our goal.
“Today, we’re rolling out our initial partnership because there’ll be more partners, and there’ll be more investors in the sub sector with four, one of them being a national NITT to roll out additional seven workshops in the next 14 days.

“We believe they can do more but what we will have to do is to double what they have in 14 days and from there we can start doubling after 14 days, in that way we can be able to get closer to our goal of having workshops everywhere there is CNG in Nigeria so that we can convert those 55, 000 vehicles.”
He said, “We have a goal, one million vehicles by the year 2027 and that allows Nigeria to save about $20 billion in 10 years and also allows us to manage transport inflation.

“You will have five people working there in two days. So, if we have 1, 000 workshops, we are talking about 5,000 jobs for technicians, including the cost of the labour and manpower that will go into the increased supply of CNG, processing stations, model stations, and refuelling stations that will not run on this ecosystem.
“So, the number of jobs that will be rolling out under this program, even under the pilot phase in six months, easily with support of about 50,000 jobs that never existed before that will be supported by this programme.”
On his part, the Special Assistant on Special Duties and Domestic Affairs to Mr. President, Toyin Subaru, stressed that the initiative was all about substituting import.

He added, “We spend over $5 billion on petrol to import it and that is what is causing all these subsidy problems that we have.
“Now, with this, we don’t even have to import what we need to operate our vehicles. It is called CNG and we have the gas here in Nigeria.
“So, the idea is just to take the gas to distribute it across Nigeria via different trucks stations. Most gas are not CNG enabled and what we are doing is to help them convert their cars so you can use petrol and CNG at the same time.
“We are going to develop an app that will enable you to know where a CNG station is located. We should be able to buy gas for our cars at N230 when today petrol is N680. So, it will help save about two-thirds of your money.”