25/09/2026
“Petrol is more expensive in the UK!”
My reply to Edo State governor, Monday Okpebholo
Yes, if you simply convert the price to naira, UK petrol is currently around ₦3,000 per litre, while petrol in Nigeria is around ₦1,400–₦1,450.
But is that the right comparison?
Let's compare petrol with the minimum wage.
UK Minimum wage: £12.71 per hour
40 hours per week = about £2,203 per month
Petrol: about £1.72 per litre
That means one litre of petrol costs only about 0.08% of a UK minimum-wage worker's monthly earnings.
Nigeria Minimum wage: ₦70,000 per month
Petrol: about ₦1,430 per litre
One litre of petrol therefore costs about 2.04% of the Nigerian minimum wage.
Put another way:
A litre of petrol consumes roughly 26 times more of the minimum wage in Nigeria than in the UK.
And look at a 50-litre tank:
UK: about £86 — roughly 4% of monthly minimum wage.
Nigeria: about ₦71,500 — more than 100% of the ₦70,000 minimum wage.
So when comparing fuel prices between countries, simply saying “fuel is ₦3,000 in Britain and ₦1,400 in Nigeria” doesn't tell the whole story.
The real question is: how much of the average worker's income does that litre of petrol consume?
By that measure, petrol places a far heavier burden on a Nigerian minimum-wage earner.
Numbers matter. Context matters even more.
© Anonymous
