By Dino Mahtani
LAGOS (Reuters) - A general strike in Nigeria which has
raised fears over oil supply from the world's seventh largest
exporter, will likely end its first phase on Thursday, union
leaders said.
"All things going well today, we should see the end of the
first phase of the strike," said Salihu Lukman, secretary
general of the umbrella union body, the Nigeria Labour Congress
(NLC) earlier on Thursday.
The four-day strike started on Monday in protest against
rising fuel prices. Unions and oil companies said that little,
if any, disruption to Nigeria's 2.3 million barrel per day
output had taken place due to the strike.
"In our town offices nobody has been coming to work but in
the field our operations have continued normally," said a
spokesman for U.S. oil giant ChevronTexaco.
But concerns about Nigerian oil supplies helped drive world
prices to a then-record high of $54.45 per barrel in New York
earlier in the week.
Most businesses including public transport across the
country had been paralyzed by the strike though by Thursday,
some shops and markets were reopening for business and more
public buses were in operation.
Unions had threatened to extend the strike if there was
more violent intimidation of union supporters following the
shooting of a young boy at a rally in the northern city of
Kaduna on Monday and arrests elsewhere in the country.
But union leaders said on Thursday they were satisfied with
the government's behavior since then and confirmed the release
of several union supporters who were detained by the
authorities.
MEETING OVER
A committee meeting attended by lawmakers, union leaders
and rights groups to find ways of cushioning the effects of the
fuel price hike ended in the capital Abuja, with an official
statement expected from the NLC later.
Civil rights leaders said they had walked out of the
meeting as they had been treated as "second class citizens"
during the meeting. The NLC delegation sat through the meeting.
Peter Akpatason, president of blue-collar oil union NUPENG,
an affiliate of the NLC, had earlier said even if the meeting
ended in outright disagreement the unions would more likely
begin focusing on a total strike in two weeks time as opposed
to extending the strike.
Unions initially said the strike would last for a four-day
warning period and would be suspended for two weeks from Friday
for negotiations on a fuel price deal.
If no deal is reached within the two-week period, the
unions threatened a total indefinite strike that could pose a
greater risk to oil exports.
The unions are demanding the government reverse a recent 20
percent hike in fuel prices to 53 naira (40 cents) per liter.
They say the increase has stoked inflation in Africa's most
populous nation and has helped impoverish the majority of
Nigerians, many of whom live on less than a dollar a day.
The NLC has become the most powerful political opposition
to President Olusegun Obasanjo since he took office in 1999,
returning Nigeria to civilian rule after 15 years of military
dictatorship.
He has tabled a new labor law which could eliminate the
NLC's official monopoly as the umbrella union, and allow
individual unions to choose their alliances freely.
