DEREGULATION: NLC takes battle to Abuja - Says FG plans to sell fuel at N104

Soji-Eze Fagbemi, Abuja - 26.10.2009

THE Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has hinted at the plan of the Federal Government to increase fuel price to N104 per litre, following unsuccessful dialogue between labour and the government.

However, the NLC is planning to stage, on Thursday, what it calls “mother of all rallies” in Abuja, to kick against the plan.

Acting President of NLC, Mr. Promise Adewusi, who led the meeting between the NLC and the Federal Government, in an interview with some labour correspondents in Abuja, said government agencies and officials were already giving an indication that the price of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), otherwise known as petrol, would go for N104 per litre.

To this end, Mr. Adewusi, who is a deputy president of the congress and who represented the NLC president, Mr. Abdulwaheed Omar, who was outside the country, at the emergency meeting, called on Nigerians to take their destiny in their own hands by coming out in their large number as the NLC holds what he tagged “mother of all rallies” in Abuja, on Thursday, against deregulation, fuel price increase, minimum wage and other vital issues.

He revealed that the government called them for the urgent meeting to help it build the confidence of Nigerians in its deregulation policy but stated that the congress rejected the policy because, according to it, deregulation in Nigeria was synonymous with fuel price increase.

Answering a question, Adewusi said: “We don’t need a prophet to tell us that the price of fuel will increase because deregulation in Nigeria is very synonymous with price increase. Already, we have prices being bandied about that a litre of PMS will go to N104, and some other time they said N94 a litre.

“Nigerians should be very prepared to pay more, and that is why we are calling on them to join the NLC to come out in their large numbers to protest the move. The NLC is ready to lead the way and as usual, will not disappoint Nigerians. But they must also come out to support the efforts. We are prepared to mobilise from North to South, East to West to stop the few from enjoying our commonwealth.”

He added: “As you know, I am just a deputy president of the NLC but directed to lead the meeting in the absence of President Omar. On your question about our meeting with the Federal Government, I will say essentially it was an explorative meeting. We used the opportunity to reinforce our opposition to deregulation and we also insisted that should government go ahead to carry out deregulation, we are going to mobilise Nigerians to come against this further act of aggression against our people. Whether they go ahead or not, on the 29th of this month, we are mobilising the Nigerian people in a very massive rally in Abuja against the total deregulation of the downstream oil sector.

“Basically, they wanted to acquaint us with their reform in the petroleum industry, particularly as it affects the downstream sector and also to deny that what we found in the newspapers were merely speculations that they had not taken a date for the commencement of the policy.

“They also used the opportunity to tell us what government thinks about deregulation. After that, what we did was to confirm if truly they had made up their mind to deregulate the sector, and we told them that, in the Nigerian context, deregulation is a direct translation to petroleum price increase. After the clarification, our worry was that they told us that their greatest challenge is how to win the confidence of Nigerians in the whole process.

“In our response, we said since you are confirming to us that you want to deregulate and that since deregulation is tantamount to fuel price increase, we are opposed to it, and we are not going to buy into it. We went ahead to give them the reasons.”

Adewusi stated that the present prices of diesel and kerosene, justified NLC’s position. He said the price of diesel before deregulation was N45, “but as I speak with you now, the price of diesel is between N120 and N250, depending on the part of the country.

“We said this cannot work because there is no way you can win the confidence of Nigerians with that kind of argument. It is the same thing with kerosene. Kerosene is not only scarce, it is also totally expensive,” he said.

Mr. Adewusi pointed out that Nigerians were already in the grip of poverty and misery, warning that workers could not afford to watch government increase this suffering and pain on the people.

“If your challenge is how to win the confidence of Nigerians, then deregulation is a very bad advertisement, because of the centrality of oil in the economic calculation of the country. It has become the nerve centre. Once you touch it, you touch every other parts of the body. Nigeria has become a generator-driven economy; industries are closing down, because there is no electricity,” he said.

He said deregulation and price increase at this time would be catastrophic, advising the government to steer clear of it.

Going by the purchasing power of the naira now against other currencies, he stated that no average Nigerian could sustain himself and his family, hence, “we said no, you can’t do this.

If you want to win the confidence of the Nigerian people, the state ought to pay for a tolerable level of comfort within this system.”