Alhaji Aliko Dangote has said that reducing diesel (AGO) price by his Dangote Refinery would drive down Nigeria’s total inflation rate.
The President of the Dangote Group made the submission while addressing journalists after paying an Eid-el-Fitr homage to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the Nigerian leader’s Lagos home.
His new refinery, Dangote said, had dropped the cost of diesel to N1,200 from the prevailing price of N1,650.
Nigeria’s headline inflation rate increased to 31.70 percent in February, compared to the January 2024 rate of 29.90 percent, going by estimates from the National Bureau of Statistics.
He noted the improvement in the naira to dollar exchange rate, which he said, is already having a positive impact, with the price of locally-produced goods such as flour dropping as businesses pay less for diesel.
He expects this dramatic reduction in fuel costs to help drive down inflation in the coming months.
Dangote said: “I believe that we are on the right track.
“I believe Nigerians have been patient and I also believe that a lot of goodies will now come through.
“There’s quite a lot of improvement because if you look at it, one of the major issues that we’ve had was the Naira devaluation that had gone very aggressively up to about N1,900.
“But right now, we’re back to almost N1,250 and N1,300, which is a good reprieve.
“You can see quite a lot of things went up. For example, something that we produce locally like flour – people charged more. Why? Because they were paying very high diesel prices.
“What we did, for example, in our refinery, is to sell diesel at about N1,200 as against N1,650 and I’m sure as we go along, things will continue to improve quite a lot.
“It’s a lot of impact. The price for a litre of diesel has been cut by almost one-third to N1,200.
“Even though the crude prices are going up, I believe people will not get it much higher than what it is today at N1,200.
“It might go a little bit lower, but that can help quite a lot because if you were transporting locally-produced goods, such as rice and other stuff at N1,650, and now you are paying one-third of that amount at N1,200, it’s a lot of difference.
“That can help to bring inflation down. And I’m sure when the inflation figures are out for the next month, there’ll be quite a lot of improvement in the rate.
“So, one step at a time. And I’m sure the government is working round the clock to make sure that things get much better. It’s in the interest of everybody.”
Urging captains of industry to partner with the government to improve lives, Dangote said: “You can’t clap with one hand. So the entrepreneurs and the government need to clap together.”
