Former Senate President Bukola Saraki has faulted claims that Nigeria consumes about 70 million litres of fuel daily.

Mr Saraki while speaking on Channels TV argued that the country could not consume more than 30 to 40 million litres of fuel daily.

“We cannot be consuming more than 30 million to 40 million litres and it is obvious there is racketeering in the oil sector,” Mr Saraki asserted.

He further alleged that “some people are benefitting and there is no way we are consuming 70 million litres,” noting that Nigeria si in a problem “because a few people are benefiting but the politicians are fixated on the 2023 elections.”

His comment came weeks after President Muhammadu Buhari earmarked the sum of N2.557 trillion for fuel subsidy in the 2022 Appropriation Act (Amendment) bill following the suspension of the implementation of the policy by the federal government.

In 2021, NNPC’s group managing director Mele Kyari claimed that the country consumed 103 million litres per day in May, going down to 70 million litres the following month.

However, Mr Saraki argued that Nigeria’s daily consumption could not be more than 30 million or 40 million litres.

This was not the first time he had disputed NNPC’s claim on daily fuel consumption.

Mr Saraki in 2019 said the President Muhammadu Buhari regime’s arbitrary subsidy payment on assumption that Nigeria consumed 50 million litres of fuel a day, was fraudulent.

SBM Intelligence reported that the costs of fuel subsidy under Mr Buhari’s regime between 2017 and 2021 increased by 890 per cent even though fuel prices had only increased by 12.1 per cent.