LAGOS- (AFP) – Grace Ojo, selling rice at a market in Nigeria’s biggest city, is fed up — both with a strike that has shut down the country and with the president whose fuel price policy sparked it.
Asked if the strike should go on to force President Goodluck Jonathan to reverse the policy, the 53-year-old mother of three has a simple message: “Don’t continue!… But let Goodluck pity us.”
It is the harsh reality of the strike — and of life in general in Africa’s most populous nation and top oil producer, long held back by deep-rooted corruption: Poor families face extremely tough choices.
If the strike goes on, the masses who work in the informal economy, and who mostly earn less than $2 per day, face being squeezed ever more tightly by their disappearing incomes.
Should the strike be called off, any hopes may fade of forcing the government to reverse its decision to end fuel subsidies on January 1, which caused petrol prices to more than double.
So far, the government has shown no sign of budging.
Government officials and economists say the fuel policy is the right one and will eventually lead to real development in the country, chiefly by redirecting public funds to infrastructure projects.
But for now, there is simply more hardship for those who already have more than their share.
The strike that began on Monday has spread throughout Nigeria, shutting businesses and bringing tens of thousands onto the streets to protest.
Oil production — Nigeria’s economic lifeblood — accounting for some two-thirds of government revenues and more than 90 percent of export earnings — has so far been unaffected.
“The only way a strike is going to affect the government, to be fair, is if it affects crude oil exports,” said Kayode Akindele, a partner with investment firm 46 Parallels.
Akindele and others say production has continued for a variety of reasons, including the fact that much of the industry is centred offshore and because many operations are automated.
Also, many oil workers are reluctant to shut down production, considering it a last resort and knowing it could take days or longer to start facilities back up again.
That means many of the poor have been left with a dilemma — they want fuel prices to come down, and the strike to be called off.
“I think the strike should end because there’s nothing going on, no way to work and get money,” said Ben Korchioga, a 26-year-old motorcycle taxi driver who was among some 150 motorists waiting outside a petrol station to see if it would open and sell them fuel.
But he also said the government should reverse its fuel subsidy policy.
“This is not the right time” to end subsidies, he said.
Some have sought to portray the protests as an opportunity for Nigeria’s own version of an Arab Spring or other kind of global protest movement, with Twitter posts using the “occupynigeria” hashtag.
But while significant numbers have turned out for protests — including around 10,000 in Lagos, the economic capital — there are questions over whether the demonstrations could evolve into something larger in the vast nation of 160 million.
Akindele, of the investment firm, points out that police have refrained from unleashing widespread violence on protesters and inflaming the situation as many had feared.
An officer has been accused of killing one person in Lagos, and at least two people were shot dead when police and protesters clashed in the northern city of Kano.
“If you started seeing 100,000, 150,000 people on the streets, that could have an impact,” said Akindele.
“The violence by Nigerian standards has been quite low.”
He said that removing the fuel subsidies “is the linchpin of the government reform policy, and I think the government is going to stand its ground”.
That is not what Nigeria’s market traders and motorcycle taxi drivers want to hear, but there seems to be little more they can do.
At the Lagos market where Ojo sells rice, there were far fewer buyers than usual. Traders said goods were not being trucked in from other states because of the strike and the higher fuel costs.
Nevertheless, life goes on — they still hawked cow legs, cut beef on top of cardboard and shredded okra, the words “Pls do not urinate here anymore” scrawled on the wall nearby.
Mary Agbor, a 23-year-old selling vegetables, was among those who said she wanted the strike to end. But she had no answers for how the government could be forced to reduce fuel prices.
“They’re the ones who have to decide it,” she said, before returning to haggle with a small crowd of customers
Asked if the strike should go on to force President Goodluck Jonathan to reverse the policy, the 53-year-old mother of three has a simple message: “Don’t continue!… But let Goodluck pity us.”
It is the harsh reality of the strike — and of life in general in Africa’s most populous nation and top oil producer, long held back by deep-rooted corruption: Poor families face extremely tough choices.
If the strike goes on, the masses who work in the informal economy, and who mostly earn less than $2 per day, face being squeezed ever more tightly by their disappearing incomes.
Should the strike be called off, any hopes may fade of forcing the government to reverse its decision to end fuel subsidies on January 1, which caused petrol prices to more than double.
So far, the government has shown no sign of budging.
Government officials and economists say the fuel policy is the right one and will eventually lead to real development in the country, chiefly by redirecting public funds to infrastructure projects.
But for now, there is simply more hardship for those who already have more than their share.
The strike that began on Monday has spread throughout Nigeria, shutting businesses and bringing tens of thousands onto the streets to protest.
Oil production — Nigeria’s economic lifeblood — accounting for some two-thirds of government revenues and more than 90 percent of export earnings — has so far been unaffected.
“The only way a strike is going to affect the government, to be fair, is if it affects crude oil exports,” said Kayode Akindele, a partner with investment firm 46 Parallels.
Akindele and others say production has continued for a variety of reasons, including the fact that much of the industry is centred offshore and because many operations are automated.
Also, many oil workers are reluctant to shut down production, considering it a last resort and knowing it could take days or longer to start facilities back up again.
That means many of the poor have been left with a dilemma — they want fuel prices to come down, and the strike to be called off.
“I think the strike should end because there’s nothing going on, no way to work and get money,” said Ben Korchioga, a 26-year-old motorcycle taxi driver who was among some 150 motorists waiting outside a petrol station to see if it would open and sell them fuel.
But he also said the government should reverse its fuel subsidy policy.
“This is not the right time” to end subsidies, he said.
Some have sought to portray the protests as an opportunity for Nigeria’s own version of an Arab Spring or other kind of global protest movement, with Twitter posts using the “occupynigeria” hashtag.
But while significant numbers have turned out for protests — including around 10,000 in Lagos, the economic capital — there are questions over whether the demonstrations could evolve into something larger in the vast nation of 160 million.
Akindele, of the investment firm, points out that police have refrained from unleashing widespread violence on protesters and inflaming the situation as many had feared.
An officer has been accused of killing one person in Lagos, and at least two people were shot dead when police and protesters clashed in the northern city of Kano.
“If you started seeing 100,000, 150,000 people on the streets, that could have an impact,” said Akindele.
“The violence by Nigerian standards has been quite low.”
He said that removing the fuel subsidies “is the linchpin of the government reform policy, and I think the government is going to stand its ground”.
That is not what Nigeria’s market traders and motorcycle taxi drivers want to hear, but there seems to be little more they can do.
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| lagos fuel protest |
Nevertheless, life goes on — they still hawked cow legs, cut beef on top of cardboard and shredded okra, the words “Pls do not urinate here anymore” scrawled on the wall nearby.
Mary Agbor, a 23-year-old selling vegetables, was among those who said she wanted the strike to end. But she had no answers for how the government could be forced to reduce fuel prices.
“They’re the ones who have to decide it,” she said, before returning to haggle with a small crowd of customers
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