Fuel subsidy can't be removed by Jan, labour insists

MAJOR stakeholders in the Nigerian economy, including the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), Trade Union Congress (TUC), Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN), Nigeria Employers' Consultative Association (NECA) and the Centre for Democratic Development, on Tuesday, told the Federal Government that it could not remove fuel subsidy by January 2012.Speaking at a roundtable on petroleum subsidy, organised by the Initiative for Peace and Industrial Harmony, at the Chelsea Hotel, Abuja, the stakeholders said removal of subsidy was not popular among Nigerians, with the present state of affairs and level of infrastructural development in all sectors of the economy, especially in the oil, power and transportation sectors.They said the majority of the Nigerian people were opposed to subsidy removal at present and would reject and fight it, because they had the right to protest against any anti-people policy of government in a democracy.The chief economist, NLC, Peter Ozoesan, said the issue of deregulation and fuel subsidy was not purely a labour matter, because the Nigerian people had rejected the policy.Regretting that energy had been the cause of a weak industrial base in the country, he argued that as an oil producing nation, fuel price must be low in Nigeria.He disagreed that the removal of subsidy on diesel had been successful, adding that it only led to the high price of diesel, which made it difficult for industries that depended on diesel for their operations.PENGASSAN President, Babatunde Ogun, stressed the need to fix the refineries, adding that the crisis was as a result of the inability of the government to fix the refineries and build new ones.NECA Director-General, Olusegun Oshinowo, said the organised private sector was yet to have a position on the issue.
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