As a Nigerian who lives in the United Kingdom, reading Governor Monday Okpebholo’s claim that Nigerians are “enjoying” the current price of fuel left me with more than disappointment. It left me with a sense of insult dressed up as economics.
The Edo State governor, speaking at the “Operation Rescue Benin-Asaba Road” event on Thursday, argued that a litre of fuel in England costs around N3,000.
On that basis, he concluded that Nigerian fuel is relatively cheap and that Nigerians should therefore count themselves fortunate. He went further, praising the President, Bola Tinubu, as an economist who is “stabilising the economy”, and dismissing critics as “supermarket people” who should wait their turn to rule.
You May Also Like
Let me state this plainly before I go any further. I am not a politician. I am not a member of any opposition party, and I am not writing this to score political points against the Edo State government. If anyone wishes to accuse me of being anti-Okpebholo, they are free to do so, but the accusation would be false. I am simply a Nigerian who lives in the United Kingdom, who fills a car with petrol here, and who also knows what it is to queue for fuel in Nigeria.
That dual experience gives me the right to say that the governor’s comparison is not merely incomplete. It is misleading.
Let us begin with the numbers themselves, because they can be verified. As of September 2026, the average price of unleaded petrol in the United Kingdom is approximately 173.9 pence per litre. At an exchange rate of roughly N1,762 to the pound, that comes to about N3,064 per litre. So the governor’s figure of N3,000 is, in itself, broadly accurate. On the surface, he is telling the truth about the British pump price.
But a price is only meaningful in relation to the income that must pay it. This is not an advanced economic insight. It is the first lesson of household budgeting, and it is the lesson the governor’s comparison carefully avoids.
According to the Office for National Statistics, the median monthly pay in the United Kingdom in January 2026 was £2,588, rising to £3,031 in London.
Converted at N1,762 to the pound, that is roughly N4.56 million per month for the average British worker. A litre of petrol at N3,064 therefore represents about 0.067 per cent of a British median monthly salary.
Now consider Nigeria. The national minimum wage, which took effect in July 2024, stands at N70,000 per month. For worker earning that amount, a litre of petrol at N1,395 consumes about 2 per cent of their entire monthly income.
In other words, the British worker spends roughly one fifteen-hundredth of their monthly pay on a litre of fuel. The Nigerian minimum-wage worker spends one fiftieth.
The burden is around thirty times heavier. Some will object that comparing a British median wage with a Nigerian minimum wage is unfair. Very well. Don’t blame me; Okpebholo started it. Let us use Nigeria’s average monthly net salary instead, then.
According to recent data, that figure is approximately £84, or about N148.000 per month. Even at this higher level, a litre of petrol still takes up nearly 1 per cent of monthly income. The disparity with the United Kingdom remains stark.
The situation becomes more troubling still when we look at how fuel affordability has changed over time. In April 2023, petrol averaged about N254 per litre, and the minimum wage was N30,000. A minimum-wage worker could then buy roughly 118 litres of fuel with a month’s pay.
Today, with petrol at about N1,400 per litre and the minimum wage at N70,000, that same worker can buy only about 50 litres. The nominal wage has more than doubled, yet the amount of fuel it can purchase has fallen by well over half.
This is not a story of Nigerians “enjoying” anything. IT is a story of purchasing power being systematically eroded, and it is a story that the governor’s comparison conceals entirely, and a sign that ignorance played a huge role in his analysis.
The World Bank adds to the sobering backdrop. In 2025, approximately 10 million Nigerians were pushed into extreme poverty, raising the share of the population living below the international poverty line from 47.7 per cent in 2024 to 50.9 per cent. More than half of all Nigerians now live on less than $3 a day.
For these citizens, the observation that British petrol is more expensive is not merely irrelevant. It is close to mockery. A person surviving on less than $3 a day does not feel comforted by the knowledge that a motorist in London pays more at the pump. They feel hungry, and they feel unheard.
The governor also leaned on Bola Tinubu’s credentials as an economist. I do not dispute that a background in economics has value. But the most basic principle of economics is precisely the one his comparison ignores: nominal prices across countries cannot be compared without adjusting for purchasing power, income levels and the cost of living.
British fuel is expensive in part because it carries substantial taxation that funds roads, public transport and public services. Nigerian fuel appears cheap, but Nigerian roads, public transport and public services are not comparable.
A lower pump price in a country with poorer infrastructure and far lower incomes is not a bargain. It is a reflection of a different and more difficult reality.
I live in the United Kingdom, and I buy fuel here. I feel the cost when I refill my tank. But I also know that my salary is paid in pounds, and that my rent, food and transport are all denominated in pounds.
I do not feel oppressed by British fuel prices relative to a Nigerian’s experience, and no sensible Nigerian should be expected to feel grateful for their own hardship simply because another country’s pump price is higher.
A serious comparison would not ask which country’s fuel is cheaper on paper. It would ask how many hours of labour are required to fill a tank in each country. It would ask what proportion of a household budget goes on transport. It would ask whether a minimum-wage worker can afford to travel to work and still feed their family.
Those are the questions that matter, and on every one of them, the picture is far bleaker than the governor’s remarks suggest. I am ot a politician. I am a Nigerian, at home and abroad, and I am writing for Nigerians at home and abroad.
When half the population lives in extreme poverty, when the minimum wage buys less than half the fuel it did three years ago, and when families must choose between food and transport, telling them they are “enjoying” is not encouragement. It is a failure to listen.
Nigeria’s leaders do not need to convince Nigerians that they are better off than the British. They need to make them better off. A comparison that cannot illuminate that task is worse than useless. It is a distraction, and the people it distracts from are the very people it claims to celebrate.
Monday Okpebholo must stop making ridiculous statements in his attempt to remain in Tinubu’s good graces. He represents the Edo people and should be working on plans to alleviate their suffering and not indirectly telling them to be grateful that they spent a chunk of their monthly salaries to buy fuel in a country without power to light the house.
More Stories
Edo Governor Okpebholo’s Demolition Spree: A Lawless Crackdown or Crime Fight?
The Nigerian Tragedy: A Nation Asleep at the Wheel
Tinubu, 2027 Polls, And The Gathering Storm
Are Godwin Obaseki and Philip Shaibu really fighting?
Bola Tinubu: Another 4 years’ Presidency of setback and obscurity
