I'll support subsidy removal under Buhari - Bakare

Pastor Tunde Bakare who opposed the removal of subsidy and joined in the anti-subsidy removal protest in 2012, said he would support the move now under President Buhari.

Bakare said this while delivering his State of the Nation address, titled, 'Roadmap to successful change,' in his church in Lagos on Sunday.

''Given the resurgence of the subsidy conundrum, it has become needful to pre-empt and inform those who have been wondering if our January 2012 protests were organised in error. Let me reiterate that the Save Nigeria Group did not mobilise the people of this country to the Gani Fawehinmi Park, Ojota, merely to protest the removal of the fuel subsidy but to challenge the corruption that defined the fuel subsidy regime. We said then that it was not a deregulation, as was being claimed by the government, but a hike in fuel price. We demanded the prosecution of those indicted in the damning report of the Farouk Lawan committee, a phenomenon we refer to as ‘Kleptoric kleptocracy unlimited’, where for instance, N999m was reportedly paid 129 times totalling N128,871,000,000 to some companies by the office of the Accountant General of the Federation. Four years later, those indicted persons have not been prosecuted. Do we still need to wonder why corruption is so endemic and very pervasive in our nation today?'' He said.

He, however, urged Buhari to channel funds saved from the removal of subsidy to other critical areas.

The Serving Overseer of the Latter Rain Assembly was Buhari’s running mate in the 2011 presidential election.