Fuel prices hiked, unions threaten strikes in protest

President Olusegun Obasanjo's government chose the 43rd anniversary of Nigeria's independence to surreptitiously raise fuel prices, prompting threats of crippling general strikes from the country's labour unions. Before Wednesday's price rises, long queues of vehicles had been building up at filling stations across the country as speculation grew of government intention to abolish price-fixing in favour of market-determined fuel prices. But while Obasanjo's anniversary broadcast avoided the topic on everybody's lips, fuel stations across Nigeria fiddled with their dispensers to set prices an average 15 percent higher than the former price of US $0.26 a litre. "We were directed by the government to fix any prices for petrol, diesel and kerosine not exceeding 40 naira," Dele Ajayi, a filling station attendant in Lagos, told IRIN. Obasanjo in his speech stressed his government's determination to pursue painful reforms, promising long-term benefits. "Fellow Nigerians, our reform programme will entail sacrifice...but this sacrifice will have manifold returns," he said. Key trade unions grouped under the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) vowed to resist the price increases, accusing the government of being indifferent to the harsh economic conditions the policy was likely to create for Nigerians, 70 percent of who live on less than one dollar a day. The unions said they would resume the crippling national strike that forced a government climb-down after fuel prices were increased by 50 percent in June. "We remind the government that the mass strikes and protests over the June increases were merely suspended and we have no alternative but to resume these strikes," said Adams Oshiomhole, NLC president. He said labor unions affiliated to his congress, including the powerful blue-collar and white-collar oil unions, will meet in the coming days to decide when to resume the strike. The government said Africa's leading oil producer should no longer spend US $2 billion a year subsidising fuel that at US $0.31 a litre is still cheap by international standards. But labour unions counter that with a minimum wage of US $38.74 a month Nigerian workers are among the most poorly paid in the world.