It is quite ironic when one comes to think of it. An attempted subsidy removal that was seen as one of the cardinal sins of former president Jonathan has now become the ultimate virtue for the present administration.
well, if you take a trip down memory lane with me, you would well remember the tumult that rocked the nation in January of 2012. Following the announcement of an increase in the price of PMS(premium motor spirit), commonly known as petrol, from N67 to N97, a social-political protest tagged "occupy Nigeria", was organised accross the country. Labour unions had declared a strike action. While the government tried to engage them to resolve the issue, protests organised by civil society organisations and other interest groups broke out accros the country. In cities like Kaduna, Benin, Abuja and Lagos, large crowds of protesters gathered at certain venues, chanting songs of solidarity. In Lagos, protesters gathered daily at the Gani Fawhehinmi park to a treat of revelling. 
The strong narrative pushed by the organisers of the protest was that subsidy removal was an anti-people policy. Despite the government's effort at clarifying the situation on why the subsidy regime is no longer sustainable, these interests groups, made up mainly of the then opposition political parties, refused to back down.
Now, coming to 2024, the major protagonists of that resistance movement to subsidy removal are now the ones in government.
The Nigeria fuel subsidy regime actually came into effect in the 1970s, following the shock in international oil market prices. The petroleum price act of 1977 later gave a legal backing to it. Since then, the process has been weighing heavily on government finances, sapping vital funds that could be better used for infrastructural development. When Olusegun Obasanjo came to power in 1999 under the current democratic dispensation, he reiterated the need to do away with the subsidy regime entirely. The masses kicked, despite expert opinions lauding the move. Eventually, the Obasanjo regime achieved the total deregulation of the prices of AGO(automotive gas oil) commonly known as diesel, while also jerking up the prices of the other major petroleum products, namely petrol and kerosene, a notch.
When Goodluck Ebele Jonathan assumed office in 2011, he brought up the issue of the subsidy removal again. His economic team were directed to engage stakeholders on the many downsides of the subsidy regime, including a drain on vital government finances, stalling investments in the petroleum downstream sector as well as massive corruption issues. But despite this effort, the major stakeholders, organized under the conspiracy of the propaganda machine of the opposition party refused to see reason in the government's well intended moves. The issue became one of the major rallying point of opposition against the government of the day. It became one of the cardinal sins of the government by which his administration was totally discredited.
Infact, in the run-up to the 2015 general elections, the Presidential candidate of the opposition political party, in one of his campaign speeches alluded to the subsidy regime as a scam by the government of the day to siphon public funds. Ironically, when he eventually came to power in 2015, he ended up spending more on subsidy than his predecessor administration. In 2016 for instance there were authenticated cases of extra-budgeting spending on subsidy by the government. This was probably done to mask up their earlier lies that the previous administration was not paying any subsidy on petroleum products. That administration eventually went ahead to deregulate the price of jet A1 otherwise known as kerosene.
And now here in 2024, someone who is believed to have been the arrowhead of the 2012 revolt against an attempted deregulation of petroleum products has turned out to be the one to have implemented the total deregulation of all the major petroleum products, much to the chagrin of the populace. This raises the question, was he actually concerned about the negative impact of the attempted deregulation in 2012 on the masses, or was he just exploiting the situation to his political advantage. It's quite disheartening to think that he has been aware of the virtue of a deregulated downstream sector all the while, as has been espoused by all his predecessors, but still chose to vilify them to score political points. This is the kind of political rigmarole and policy somersaults that has much impeded the political development of most African democraticies. And indeed, achieving true political and infrastructural development in Africa may remain stalled except this kind of pull-him-down syndrome is jettisoned among the political class in African democracies.