By Ikugbadi Oluwasegun
Wale Edun, the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, has announced that starting from October 2024, the federal government is expected to generate approximately N700 billion each month from the profits obtained through crude oil sales in Naira, as well as from the implementation of subsidy removal policies.
Edun disclosed this information during a press briefing following the National Economic Council (NEC) meeting, which was led by Vice President Kashim Shettima.
He said, “As a result of the latest initiative to have local refineries pay for crude in Naira and thereby sell the PMS in Naira, it has provided a veritable platform for moving to a stage where we have market pricing of petroleum products, market pricing of foreign exchange, and that has led to immediate gains of around N600-N700 billion per month, starting from October, which will feed into the Federation Account.
“No doubt, NNPC will say that there are some charges here and there that they want to remove from that sum, but effectively, the country is better off now by a huge amount, which will continue to increase as long as the major critical reforms of pricing petroleum properly, pricing foreign exchange properly are maintained.”