As the fuel price surged to N617 naira on Tuesday, the country is facing further hardships.
GOVIMA indicates that a significant number of Nigerians have resorted to walking (trekking), due to the challenges brought about by the increased fuel costs.
GOVIMA had reported that Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), CEO, Mele Kyari, linked the petrol pump price surge from N540 to N617 per litre to Market Forces.
In response to the recent increase in the pump price of petrol, The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), expressed deep concern and stated that it was appalled by the development.
Comrade Joe Ajaero, made this statement expressing their reaction to the recent increase in the pump price of petrol.
He emphasized that they have refrained from making further public comments on the “vexatious issues around the recent but unfortunate unilateral hike in the price of PMS in the guise of the so-called subsidy withdrawal.”
Ajaero warned that this move has resulted in unimaginable and unprecedented hardship, sorrow, anguish, and suffering for Nigerian workers and the masses, as they had previously cautioned.
He asserted that their patience is firmly grounded in their unwavering trust in the outcomes of social dialogue processes and their mechanisms, particularly in a democratic setting.
“It is this belief that we are sure has continued shaping the actions of this government since its inauguration on the 29th day of May, 2023 to continue inflicting mindless and heartless pains on the populace one after the other without the decency of embracing the tenets of democracy, which requires wide and deep stakeholder consultation on weighty matters of state.
“As it stands, rather than reciprocate the goodwill of Nigerian workers, the federal government has insisted on threading the path of dictatorship and seeking to impoverish the people further by taking steps that can only be described as robbing the people of Nigeria to pay and feed the rich.
“It is on this basis that the NLC strongly condemns the decision of the Tinubu led administration to seek the approval of the National Assembly to obtain another tranche of external loans worth N500b from the World Bank for the purposes of carrying out a phantom palliative measure to cushion the effect of its poorly thought-out hike in the prices of Premium Motor Spirit.
Speaking on the Presidency N8,000 palliative, The NLC boss describes it as insult on collective intelligence.
“The proposal to pay N8,000 to each of the so-called 12 million poorest Nigerian households for a period of six months insults our collective intelligence and makes a mockery of our patience and abiding faith in social dialogue, which the government may have alluded to albeit pretentiously,”
The labor leader strongly criticized the proposal to allocate N70 billion to National Assembly members and N36 billion to the judiciary, among other expenditures.
He expressed disdain towards what he deemed as the most insensitive, reckless, and blatant diversion of the nation’s collective resources into the pockets of public officers whose duty is to safeguard the country’s treasury.
He added that it appeared the federal government was only deceiving Nigerians on how to manage the subsidy removal for the benefit of all.
