NLC to FG: We’ll resist hike in electricity tariff, petrol price

The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has declared its readiness to resist any attempt by the Federal Government (FG) to hike electricity tariff, and increase the pump price of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), otherwise known as petrol.

NLC President, Comrade Ayuba Wabba, made this known via a statement he issued to felicitate with Nigerians on the New Year celebration on Saturday.

Wabba, in the statement titled, ‘Year 2022 Felicitations: Keeping Our Hopes And Aspirations Alive In the New Year’, noted that the NLC has told the government in very clear terms that Nigerians have suffered enough and will not endure more punishment by way of further petrol and electricity price increases.

He added that the increase of the pump price of petrol by the federal government is a transfer of failure and inability to effectively govern Nigerians.

He noted that the FG has failed to manage Nigeria’s four oil refineries and lack ability to build new ones more than 30 years after the last petrochemical refinery in Port Harcourt was commissioned.

His words: “The government is not relenting in its determination to push through further increases in the pump price of petrol and which as usual had been dubbed as “removal of petrol subsidy”.

“Well, Organized Labour has made its position clear on this matter. We have told government in very clear terms that Nigerians have suffered enough and will not endure more punishment by way of further petrol and electricity price increases.

“Our position in this regard is predicated on four major grounds. First is our concern on the deceit and duplicity associated with the politics of “petrol price increase” by successive Nigerian governments.

“The truth is that the perennial increase by government of the pump price of petrol is actually a transfer of government failure and inability to effectively govern to the poor masses of our country.

“We are talking of the failure of government to manage Nigeria’s four oil refineries and inability to build new ones more than 30 years after the last petrochemical refinery in Port Harcourt was commissioned; the failure to rein in smuggling; and the failure to determine empirically the quantity of petrol consumed in Nigeria. The shame takes a gory dimension with the fact that Nigeria is the only OPEC country that cannot refine her own crude oil.”

Wabba vowed that workers would protest the planned increment.

“At our organ meetings which took place between December 15 and 17, 2021, the Nigeria Labour Congress took a decision to protest the planned hike in the pump price of petrol by government. The protest has been scheduled to take place in all the 36 states of the federation on the 27th of January 2022. The protest in the state would culminate in the submission of protest letters to the 36 State Governors.

“Subsequently, on the 1st of February 2022, there would be a national protest to be held in the Federal Capital Territory. We urge Nigerian workers and people to dust their sneakers and fully participate in the peaceful protests and rallies aimed at salvaging our economic future.”