The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) has insisted that Nigeria’s public refineries must be made to work and the country must stop the importation of refined petrol before it can consider the removal of petrol subsidy.

The NLC President, Ayuba Wabba, said this in a statement signed and made available to journalists on Saturday in Abuja.

The NLC statement was an apparent reaction to an earlier one by Festus Keyamo, a spokesperson for the presidential campaign of the ruling party, APC. Mr Keyamo had tasked the NLC to explain its stance on the statement by Peter Obi, the Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate, that he would remove petrol subsidy if elected.

Mr Wabba said the NLC had painstaking processes and had articulated a Nigerian Workers’ Charter of Demands which the organised labour would use to engage the political process.

“A major demand in the Nigerian Workers Charter of Demands is that our local public refineries must work.

“We have also demanded that we must stop 100 per cent importation of refined petroleum products.

“The NLC and indeed the labour movement in Nigeria had over many decades been vehemently consistent that the only way to address the issue of the so-called petrol subsidies is to get our refineries to work.

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“The logic is very simple: it is not economical to buy from abroad at very expensive prices a product that a country like ours can easily produce at home,’’ he said.

Mr Wabba said the NLC wanted a ‘production economy’ for Nigeria in the handling of its natural resources.

He said that the congress believed that the rescue of Nigeria from the current path of a ‘consumption economy’ to a ‘production economy’ was the only way to resolve Nigeria’s economic nightmares of massive depletion of scarce foreign exchange reserves.

He said this would resolve the continuous devaluation of the Naira, significant jobs reduction, poverty and downturn in the living standards of the people.

“In a determined effort to popularise the positions in the Nigerian Workers Charter of Demands, the NLC and TUC at the behest of the Labour Party on Monday and Tuesday hosted a National Retreat of the leadership cadres in our movement.

“At the retreat, the Labour Party and Organised Labour in Nigeria adopted and mainstreamed the Workers Charter of Demands into the Manifesto of the Labour Party.

“This is in line with our persuasion that issue-based campaign anchored on the manifesto of political parties should drive Nigeria’s political process.

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“If any political party goes around saying that they plan to sell our refineries, remove subsidies, they should be ready to defend such stance to Nigerians at the campaigns,” he added.

Mr Wabba said the NLC’s position had not changed but only “got amplified.”

NLC and Peter Obi
Mr Obi, a capitalist who believes in massive roles for the private sector in the economy, has been careful not to directly oppose the stance of the NLC on petrol subsidy.

In his recent interview with CNN, the Labour Party candidate criticised the Buhari administration for not repairing Nigeria’s four universities.

He said there was no reason the country’s refineries should not be put to use. He also pledged to encourage the private sector to build more refineries.

“There is no reason why we should not encourage the private sector to build refineries and operate them. And they are not rocket science. You can use today to decide to remove fuel subsidies and use the resources to support critical areas of production,” Mr Obi said.

Presidential aspirant Peter Obi.
Presidential aspirant Peter Obi.
Mr Obi, who is enjoying growing popularity, especially among young, social media savvy Nigerians, also enjoys the support of the NLC.

On Monday, Mr Wabba, speaking at a retreat of the LP, pledged to mobilise all members of NLC to support Mr Obi, who has consistently maintained that fuel subsidy must be removed.

Fuel subsidy is going to be one of the main issues the next administration will have to contend with considering that the current administration plans to only finance subsidies till June 2023.

According to the government, it will take over N6 trillion to finance it in 2023.

NLC must come clean on subsidy
Earlier in his statement, Mr Keyamo, who is also the minister of state for labour and employment, said NLC must state its position on fuel subsidy removal.

He noted that the position of the labour union leaders must be consistent with the position of the workers.

“Before adopting Mr Peter Obi as its candidate, did the leadership of the NLC have a discussion with him on the issue of removal of fuel subsidy?

“If they did have that discussion, did Mr Peter Obi agree to back down on the issue of subsidy removal? Was that a basis for supporting him? If he did not back down on the issue, did organised Labour agree with him?

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“If no such discussion is held, does it mean the leadership of the NLC now fully supports the removal of fuel subsidy? Or will that not be reckless of the NLC to adopt a candidate without thoroughly interrogating the candidate on his policies as they affect the Nigerian workers or the masses? The NLC must make a public statement and come clean on this,” Mr Keyamo said.

Mr Keyamo argued that “if the excuse is that Mr Peter Obi has said that the money saved will be used in other critical areas of the economy, how is that different from what Buhari’s Government is also saying?”

The 2023 race is believed to be a four-horse race between Bola Tinubu of APC, Atiku Abubakar of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Rabiu Kwankwaso of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) and Mr Obi.
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