President Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) Ayuba Wabba has said the position of labour on the removal of petrol subsidies has not changed.
Wabba, disclosed this in a statement signed apparently in response to Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo’s challenge to the NLC to come out clean on its stand on the Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate, Peter Obi’s decision to remove fuel subsidy, if elected.
Keyamo is also the Spokesperson of the presidential campaign of All Progressives Congress (APC).
According to Wabba, the NLC had made a lot of work and articulated a Nigerian Workers’ Charter of Demands which the organised labour would be using to engage the political process.
He said the effort was part of of the commitment of the NLC on issues-based campaign in the run up to the 2023 General Elections.
“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.
“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.
Central to Labour demand on the management of Nigeria’s mineral resources, Wabba explained that the downstream petroleum sub-sector was the issue of Production Economy.
He noted that the NLC believed that the rescue of Nigeria from the current path of Consumption Economy to Production Economy was the only way to resolve Nigeria’s economic nightmares of massive depletion of scarce foreign exchange reserve.
Wabba said paradigm shift 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.
“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.
