By Seun Adams As the federal government appears trapped in weighing option of whether to remove fuel subsidy or not, the Executive Director, Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre ((CISLAC) and Transparency International Nigeria (TIN), Mr. Awal Musa Rafsanjani, has argued that fuel subsidy is fueling corruption and a disguise exploitation of the Nigerian people. Reacting to government’s position not to remove the subsidy in the time being, Rafsanjani, while reacting from USA in a statement made available to SHARPEDGENews Online, said: “Our stand as CSO is that there is nothing like fuel subsidy as Nigerians are buying fuel in a very expensive way, it is corruption and exploitation in the name of subsidy.” According to him, this view has been established even by President Muhammadu Buhari in his many interviews which he granted, stressing, that officials of government should stop deceiving Nigerians. He said: “The amount spent by this government is more than enough to fix or build functional quality refineries but because some people want to continue to siphon public funds they will not repair our refineries. “You remember both the President and the Minister of State for Petroleum promised to fix our refineries three years ago but because people in authority don’t have respect for Nigerians and are not accountable for their actions there is no refineries functioning as promised. “When you look at the amount Nigerians are buying petroleum products and compare it with other countries where they are oil producing countries you will see that government is not subsidizing any thing.” At the inception of this government in 2015, the Executive Director, averred that they referred to fuel subsidy as a fraudulent payment and that they will not pay any more. “They even increased the price in the preparation of total removal for paying this dubious and non existence so called subsidy. “But still this government pays outrageous amount in the name of fuel subsidy yet if you travel out of major cities, Nigerians are buying fuel double of the amount you see in the major cities. “Our argument is that, Nigerians are being exploited by both paying high amount to buy fuel and the government is also paying dubious amount to some powerful people which they promised to stop three years ago.” He said. The National Assembly and executive, according to him have established that there is corruption in the subsidy regime but still no action has been taken to end it, he added. He said: “There is no value for money in this so-called subsidy, because they have already increased the amount of petroleum products so there is no body subsidy anything for Nigerians.” According to him, the money spent so far on subsidy by government is enough to fix the refineries, health care facilities and education. He said the absence of accountability and lack of priority setting allowed have allowed the fraud and exploitation to continue, he added.