NIGERIA: General strike blunts IMF-ordered price hike

On June 13, the general strike that began a week earlier forced the
Nigerian federal government to all but reverse fuel price increases it
had announced earlier. On June 1, the government of President Olusegun
Obasanjo had announced a surprise decision to impose a 50% price increase
on petrol (from 20 naira per litre to 30 naira — about US$0.30), diesel
fuel (19 naira to 29 naira) and kerosene (17 naira to 27 naira).

Students reacted immediately in many parts of the country with militant
daily protests that began on June 5 after the government refused to reverse
the increases. The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) was forced by pressure
from workers to begin an indefinite general strike a day earlier than planned.

The increases were the result of the government's decision to withdraw
price subsidies. The increases immediately flowed to public transport fares
and food prices. Nigeria's workers and poor would have been hard hit by
the increase in the price of kerosene, the main fuel for cooking.

The ending of fuel subsidies was a main condition for a US$1 billion
International Monetary Fund stand-by loan. Nigeria also needs IMF endorsement
of its economic policies if its US$31 billion foreign debt is to be restructured
at a meeting in Paris later this year.

Adams Oshiomhole, president of the NLC, accused President Obasanjo of
working in the interests of the big foreign-owned oil companies. The NLC's
central working committee described the price hikes as “most insensitive,
inconsiderate and punitive to the citizens of the country, especially the
workers and masses of Nigeria”.

The strike was most effective in the major cities of the south-west:
Lagos, Benin City, Ibadan, Akure and Abeokuta. Tens of thousands of workers
blocked streets and built barricades in Lagos and Abeokuta on June 7. Students,
organised by the National Association of Nigerian Students, participated
strongly. The strike was also effective in the northern town of Ilorin
and the capital, Abuja, where federal civil servants observed the strike.

The key oil industry unions, the white-collar PENGASSAN and the blue-collar
NUPENG, joined the strike on June 8. The oil industry is Nigeria's main
source of export income.

The NLC rejected an offer by the government on June 6 to halve the price
increases on petrol and diesel and to drop the kerosene price altogether.
The NLC insisted that the rises had to be reversed completely before workers
would return to work.

On June 12, the government offered to reduce the petrol and diesel increase
to just 2 naira and to completely drop the price rise for kerosene. The
NLC accepted the compromise and called off the strike.

The national strike and student demonstrations may mark the end of the
honeymoon period that the “reformer” Obasanjo has enjoyed since his election
on February 27 last year. Obasanjo was the endorsed candidate of the dominant
faction of Nigeria's powerful military after it agreed to the return of
civilian rule after decades of military dictatorship. He is also strongly
backed by the US and British governments.

Oshiomhole told a mass rally in Lagos on June 7: “Nigerians paid great
sacrifices with their sweat and blood for the enthronement of the present
democratic rule to improve their welfare but the government has gone further
to unleash more suffering on the people”.

Seteolu Bamidele, who teaches at Lagos State University, told This
Day newspaper on June 7: “The [Obasanjo] government seems to prefer
the IMF/World Bank prescriptions ... Nigeria was under structural adjustment
for nearly a decade and what we had [to show] for it were poverty, marginalisation,
human under-development, infrastructural collapse, industrial capacity
under-utilisation, the bastardisation of the naira, dumping and closure
of factories — a huge social cost.”

Both houses of the Nigerian parliament had passed resolutions demanding
that Obasanjo reverse the fuel price increases. Several state governors
also backed the strikers' demands.

BY NORM DIXON

From GLW issue 409