Benson Upah is the spokesperson for the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC). In this interview with Weekend Trust, he expressed concern that the price of fuel may increase to N5,000 per litre. He added that the recent increase runs contrary to the agreement the union reached with the federal government.
During the week, the price of petrol went up again. What will the NLC do about it?
We are planning to have a meeting with the appropriate organs of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC). Those organs will take the decisions. We will take decisions that we believe would be in the best interest of our members and possibly, this country.
Not to pre-empt the outcome of the meeting, what should Nigerians expect?
It will be difficult for me to preempt what the NLC will do because the organ has a very large membership. Let me use the example of the National Executive Council of the NLC; it comprises the president, general secretaries and treasurers of all affiliate unions.
It also comprises state chairmen and secretaries of the state councils of the 36 states and the FCT, as well as members of the National Executive Council of the NLC. So, you can see it is a big family. In the absence of a delegates’ conference, it is the highest organ making body of the congress. So, there will be multiple ideas coming in; you know, we usually have robust debates. We look at issues and the implications from multiple perspectives. I will not be able to preempt the direction for you.
Nonetheless, the mood, I can tell you, is that of anger and I want to say that it is not only within the Nigerian Labour Congress that you have anger. Virtually every Nigerian is angry, except that first one per cent that is maintained by the state. You know, that one per cent has everything; we give them everything, those are the only ones who are not complaining. Every other Nigerian is complaining. So, our mood is reflective of the general mood of the country.
Recently, the president of the NLC said President Tinubu betrayed the union, can you elaborate more on this?
After the announcement, the next day, a Senior Special Assistant to the President on Print Media, Mr Abdulaziz Abdulaziz, said we were lying and there was no agreement. We want to reiterate that we feel betrayed by the present increase in the pump price of petroleum products.
One, when Mr. President called for the negotiation, recall that we were stuck at N62,000 and he made two offers; the first was to agree on the N250,000 we recommended while the price of PMS will rise to N1,500 or N2,000 or he will pay N62,000 and the status quo remains. He told us we had a few hours to consult. The labour leaders did not take the bait, rather we asked to be given more time and later requested at least one week to consult outside the Villa. At the end of that one week, the Presidency met again and the labour leaders unambiguously said we would not accept the offer of N250,000.
This was out of consideration for the well-being of the average Nigerian, because we said ‘what would be the effect of this on the ordinary person?’
To keep this brief, the president acted in breach of his promise to labour leaders and he knows the truth. But let us even look at this matter; what has happened goes beyond the parameters of minimum wage and negotiation. It negatively affects the generality of Nigerians. Since the first wave of price increase, occasioned by the removal of fuel subsidy on May 29, 2023, Nigerians have been trying to reorder their lives to accept the fate they never bargained for.
Coming to terms with 500 per cent hike in cost of education, transportation, food and everything else is not easy. At a time they were just trying to adjust to the new normal, you introduce another shock. So, what we have now is uncertainty; we have moved from pain to uncertainty. In fact, this matter goes beyond the logic and philosophy of our national minimum wage.
When the president mentioned that fuel price will increase to N2,000, one of the labour leaders interjected him and said, ‘Sir, you have removed fuel subsidy, so which other thing are you removing again?’ Remember, the subsidy was removed and prices were stabilised. So, how many times are you removing subsidy, that you have removed? Subsidy was never restored at any point in time as they claimed. So, what will inform moving the pump price of PMS from N650 to N1,500 or N2,000?
I want to tell you something, what this signals is that Nigerians have not seen the end yet, we may end up paying nothing less than N5,000 per liter for fuel in this country. We hope not to get there but if we get there, the decision will be left to Nigerians.
Can the president justify the increase from N650 to N1,000 vis-à-vis the current minimum wage?
I would have said let the president answer that question, but clearly, there is no correlation between the national minimum wage and what he has done. In fact, at the time we demanded N615,000 as the national minimum wage, we broke it down to say N40,000 for rent, N20,000 for food for a family of six. Our permutations were based on a family of six, a husband, wife and four children. We were able to justify that.
We were patriotic enough by coming down to N250,000. But of course, even at that, you saw what the president did. He gave us the devil’s alternatives to choose from and we chose the one we felt was going to be less injurious to Nigerians, believing that he will keep his word but barely a month after, he violated it.
What is the status of the minimum wage, has the federal government commenced payment?
Only one state has started paying and it is Adamawa. We commend the governor for the spirit. But of course, while the process of negotiation was going on, the Edo State governor paid N70,000, with a promise to pay more if the minimum wage was to be resolved to something higher. Lagos paid N70,000. Other than this, I am not aware that other states have started paying, though committees have been put together to work out consequential adjustments to enable them commence payment.
I must tell you; governments are very rich now. What they declare and share from the federation account used to be N700bn, which has since moved to N1.3trn. That is what they declare and it does not include the ones they keep aside and pass under the table. With all of that, have you seen any improvement in the quality of the life of Nigerians? There has been no commensurate improvement, rather what we have been getting is pain, penury and trauma.
What do you think will happen to the other promises the government made; like the CNG buses and other incentives they promised after removing the subsidy in the first instance?
We do not expect much from those promises. How many CNG buses have you seen as an individual? At the time those promises were made, we were also meeting with Innoson Motors, a local brand. We were also in discussion with a reliable foreign firm that makes CNG buses, Yutong, in China. They said they were ready. They assured us they will provide facilities to offer Nigerians soft loans to convert to CNG. At that time, the government said it would cost N800,000 to do it but these people were ready to do it at N250,000.
These facts were made available to the government, yet nothing happened and those conversations fizzled into thin air. So, compare that with what General Ibrahim Babangida did, when he made his own increment. IBB ensured that every state government had a transport company and even labour had a transport company known as Labour Transport Company. It was by virtue of what IBB did, trying to manage the effects of the minimal change when he did his own increase. It was even a minor increase that IBB did compared to what we are now seeing. So, he was prepared and there was no noticeable side effect.
Also, Abacha introduced PTDF, chaired by Gen. Muhammadu Buhari. The impact of PTDF was cross-sector, including providing exercise books. Clearly, our military leaders were better prepared than what we are witnessing today because they anticipated the effects and they were prepared for them.
The president announced that subsidy was gone and did not think of what will be the consequential effects of this policy pronouncement.
The Nigerian government and some other persons believe the current economic challenges are pains Nigerians have to bear for a better tomorrow, what do you have to say to that?
They are insulting our collective intelligence. Those who make such comments are not competent to do so because they are isolated from the pains we bear. The National Council of State passed a vote of confidence on the president the other day, all of them are on subsidy. Let me say this, all of them don’t pay for petrol; they don’t pay for light. We did say that they were not competent to pass any vote of confidence. It is Nigerians; those who face this heat that are competent to pass a vote of confidence.
Those that say we should bear the pains should be jailed or shot. For how long are we supposed to continue like this? This situation has gotten to a point where our yesterday is always better than our today.
I keep telling people who say Buhari was the worst that they are joking. For us at Labour, we found Buhari very accommodating. He did everything humanly possible to ensure that life was stable and good. When he came in, he gave money to the states to pay the backlog of salaries and pensions but it was diverted. He made other interventions to avoid the insane increases.
If you ask those same people now, they will tell you that the Buhari administration was very good. We are talking about less than two years ago. Before Buhari came, it was Jonathan. We said Jonathan had messed up this country, but now look at the indices and compare the exchange rate, the interest rate, the debt. So, we are in a situation where we are progressively getting worse.
Those people who say we need these pains should be shot, how much of these pains would they bear themselves? They can’t even bear one per cent of it. It is because they are isolated from this trauma; that is why they have the effrontery to say that we need the pain. We don’t need these pains. We don’t need the president who will come and complain. When this one first came, he said, ‘I asked for this job’. I was impressed by that, but later he said that these problems were caused by his predecessor. When any leader begins to talk like that, that leader has come to the end of the road in terms of ideas.
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