• Governors Urged to Spend 5% of FAAC on Free Student Transport.
By Timothy Ejoh
Nigeria’s 36 state governors and the Minister of the FCT have been urged to take responsibility for intra-state transport, with a proposal for free rides for students and a ₦500 maximum fare within cities.
This
was contained in a statement on X lby Senator Shehu Sani. He rejected the proposal by the ADC presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, to reinstate the fuel subsidy if elected in 2027.
Sani described the fuel subsidy as a policy that “made a few men billionaires” and “fed smugglers at our borders” without benefiting ordinary Nigerians.
“Atiku Abubakar is wrong,” he said. “Bringing back the fuel subsidy is not the answer. We tried it for forty years. It never once put money in the pocket of the woman selling tomatoes by the roadside. Going back to it would be going back to the same thieves,” the statement read.
The former lawmaker commended President Bola Tinubu for removing the subsidy, describing it as a difficult but necessary decision.
“You have also sent far more money to the states than any President before you. The Federal Government has done its part. Now the states must do theirs,” he said.
He argued that subsidising transport within a state is constitutionally a state responsibility, not that of the Federal Government.
“Moving people around Ilorin is not the work of Abuja, it is the work of the Kwara State Government. Moving people around Kano is the work of the Kano State Government. Moving people around Lagos is the work of the Lagos State Government,” he added.
Sani cited the 2023 constitutional amendment, which he said gave governors more power over transport than any administration in Nigeria’s history, but accused them of failing to use it.
To ease the burden on commuters, he proposed a four-point plan for all states:
*Free rides for students* to and from school.
*₦500 maximum fare* for any trip within a city. Fares in smaller towns should be even lower.
*No purchase of government buses.* Instead, register existing commercial drivers, regulate fares, and pay drivers the difference as subsidy.
*Proof-based payment* using GPS tracking and tap cards to ensure only completed trips are paid for and to eliminate fraud.
He argued that the plan would guarantee income for drivers and leave more money in citizens’ pockets for food, rent, medicine, and school fees.
The statement highlighted the jump in FAAC allocations to states from ₦2.8 trillion in 2022 to ₦7.3 trillion in 2025 following subsidy removal, and asked: “Where did it go?”
He urged each state to dedicate “no more than five per cent” of its FAAC allocation to the transport subsidy plan.
“If a governor cannot find five per cent to stop his own people from suffering, then the problem in that state was never money,” he concluded.
The statement also noted the rise in transport costs, from ₦644 per bus trip in December 2022 to ₦1,431 today, saying many Nigerians now “work half the month just to pay for transport.”