Unions suspend strike action after Nigeria fuel subsidy partially reinstated

LAGOS // Nigeria unions suspended their nationwide strike today, hours after President Goodluck Jonathan partially reinstated subsidies to keep petrol prices low and after authorities deployed soldiers, who fired over the heads of protesters.

Peter Esele, president of the Trade Union Congress, cast the sudden developments as a victory for labour unions as the strike was entering its sixth day. However, many Nigerians remain angry that petrol prices rose at all in a nation where few see benefits from the country's oil riches, and protesters' rage also turned on government corruption and inefficiency.

Just before the strike was suspended, soldiers in Lagos fired apparent live rounds over the heads of several hundred protesters who were walking to a park where demonstrations were held last week - and where armoured personnel carriers and troops awaited.

The president's announcement came after talks with unions had failed to resolve the dispute, with labour leaders demanding a return to pre-January 1 petrol prices.

Mr Jonathan charged that the protests had been "hijacked" by those seeking to promote "discord, anarchy and insecurity".

"Government will continue to pursue full deregulation of the downstream petroleum sector," Mr Jonathan said in his address.

"However, given the hardships being suffered by Nigerians, and after due consideration and consultations with state governors and the leadership of the National Assembly, government has approved the reduction of the pump price of petrol to 97 naira (about Dh2) per litre."

He added: "I urge our labour leaders to call off their strike and go back to work."

The government had ended fuel subsidies on January 1, causing petrol prices to more than double from 65 naira per litre to 140 naira or more, sparking the strike and protests that began on January 9.

Most in the country of some 160 million people live on less than US$2 a day, and Nigerians weary after years of blatant corruption view the subsidies as their only benefit from the nation's oil wealth.

Besides seizing main protest sites, soldiers yesterday also set up roadblocks at key points in the economic capital Lagos for the first time since the protests began, stopping cars and searching them.

One senior police officer at the main Lagos protest site made no pretence of the aim of the deployment.

"It is total surrender to the might of the federal government," he said. "They cannot come here again today in view of this situation."

Nigeria Labour Congress chief Abdulwahed Omar said: "We came to a conclusion that we will stay at home, that is stay off the streets, in order to make sure that we don't in the first instance endanger innocent lives because of the security situation in the country."

Nigeria has faced spiralling violence, most of it in the country's north and blamed on Islamist group Boko Haram, prompting warnings of a wider religious conflict and even the possibility of civil war.

But the main fuel protests have been largely peaceful, although at least 15 people are believed to have been killed in various incidents.

Government officials and economists have said removing subsidies would allow much of the $8 billion a year in savings to be ploughed into projects to improve the country's woefully inadequate infrastructure.