Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola has decried the inability of the federal government to curb oil theft, stating that between 2013 and 2014, the country has lost over N1.2 trillion to illegal bunkerers. He said that the problem with Nigeria lies with the mismanagement of the nation's resources, noting that since 1999, Nigeria has been governed by those who have no business being in government.

Speaking in Ilorin, Kwara State at the birthday and public presentation of six books written by the vice-president of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Issa Aremu, Aregbesola declared that Nigerians have continued to experience decline in their lives.

The governor, who is the South-West coordinator of All Progressives' Congress (APC) presidential campaign, lampooned the federal government for not being able to stop the theft of 400, 000 barrels of oil per day despite having the control of military apparatuses.

"Let us assume that stolen oil cannot attract premium price. Between those months, oil price in the international market was between $110 and S115. Let say because the 400,000 barrels of crude oil would be sold at $50 per barrel. If you multiply $50 by 400,000 barrels of crude oil, you would get $20 million," Aregbesola stated.

"It simply means $20 million is being lost to theft. Now multiply $20 million by 12 months by seven days in a week and by 54 weeks. I did a summary of this and I arrived at $7.5 billion," he said. "Between July 2013 and July 2014 Nigeria has lost that princely sum of money to oil theft. For those of you who can still not comprehend what $7.5 billion means, practically Nigeria lost N1.2 trillion to oil theft," the governor explained.

He said the depression in the oil market was as a result of indiscipline in the Nigeria's oil sector as well as crisis in the Middle East.