The effects of the three-day warning strike by the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) have started being felt in the capital city, Abuja and the Northern cities of Kano and Kaduna, as business activities were paralyzed yesterday.
NUPENG had embarked on the strike yesterday to press home its demand to end what it termed unfair labour practices by some international oil companies (IOCs) toward its members.
The development saw the re-emergence of illegal fuel vendors popularly known as black marketers across the nook and cranny of Abuja and other states hit by the scarcity, as most filling stations ran out of the product while those open to business had unimaginable queues.
NUPENG cited unfair labour practices by Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC), Chevron Nigeria Limited and Nigeria Agip Oil Company as reason for the industrial action and directed petroleum tanker drivers not to load products in all fuel depots and tank farms across the country during the three days’ warning strike.
According to the NUPENG president Achese Igwe, the accused oil companies engage in unfair labour practice through casualisation of Nigerian workers and outsourcing of workers, among other issues, warning that the union would embark on an indefinite strike after the three-day warning strike if government and the relevant authorities failed to address its grievances.
In a survey round the city of Abuja, this correspondent sighted droves of black marketers selling fuel to desperate motorists who were taken unawares by the strike action.
At the popular NNPC mega station in the Central Area, the queue had resulted in partial blockage of the adjoining road and a horrendous traffic jam, while commuters were stranded at various bus-stops as commercial bus drivers jerked up their fares.
The situation was also not different at the Conoil filling station, Central Area, opposite the NNPC Towers: long queues of vehicles were seen around the station.
Some motorists who were interviewed while on queue at the various filling stations visited expressed dismay at the development, calling on government to immediately step in to address the situation.
Danladi Mohammed, a taxi driver, lamented that he was caught unawares by the strike.
“I have been on this queue now for more than two hours, and I still do not know when I am going to get fuel, because the tension of getting fuel is not making things go orderly. I wish the government could settle the issue that is causing the warning strike before it gets out of hand,” he said.
Another commuter, Jude Ikanka, said the effect of the strike was already being felt as drivers had capitalised on the strike to hike transport fares. “When I got to NICON Junction, there was no vehicle. We stood there for a very long time. Even the one we managed to get said that he would take us to our destination for N100 instead of N50. They just doubled the transport fare,” he said.
In Kaduna metropolis, no filling station opened for services as black marketers took advantage of the situation to sell four litres of fuel at between N700 and N800.
It was gathered that although most filling stations in Kaduna had the product in stock, they refused to sell to the public.
The situation resulted in increase in transport fares within the state and even from Kaduna to neighbouring states, causing undue hardship for residents.
Meanwhile, residents of Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, and its environs are yet to experience queues in petrol stations as well as increase in the pump price of petroleum products following the warning strike, commercial bus drivers told our reporter that they were preparing for the impact.
A commercial bus driver who plied the Lagos Bus-Stop-Borokiri route said that commercial drivers will certainly increase their fares if the effect of the strike begins to bite them.
Similarly, the effect of the warning strike was not yet visible in Lagos as many filling stations were still selling the products to their customers. But drivers of commercial vehicles who spoke with our correspondents said they were bracing up for the impact and would not hesitate to increase fares if the scarcity hit Lagos.
Meanwhile, as the strike enters its second day, the scheduled meeting between the minister of petroleum, Diezeni Alison-Madueke, and officials of NUPENG failed to hold yesterday.
Speaking at a press briefing with journalists, NUPENG national president Achese Igwe said the meeting failed to hold because staff members of the ministry were protesting against the minister in her office and that she was not in the office to attend to officials of the union.
“We even learnt she was not in town,” Igwe said, adding that the minister of labour and productivity, Emeka Wogu, had however summoned a meeting with the union to discuss the strike.
He warned that if their demand was not met after the expiration of the three days’ warning strike, the union would embark on an indefinite strike.
While debunking insinuations that the strike action would affect other Nigerians, he said, “What the union is doing is to protect Nigerian workers from unfair treatment being meted out to them by multinational oil companies.”
Igwe pointed out that if agreements reached with the multinational companies at a meeting called by the minister of labour and productivity in May 2012 had been implemented, these issues would have been resolved.
NUPENG is also protesting the alleged refusal of the National Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO) to implement the signed collective bargaining agreement with petroleum tanker drivers, and the sorry state of Nigerian roads.
Meanwhile, the management of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has assured that it has adequate stock of petroleum products and called on members of the public to refrain from panic-buying or hoarding of products.
The Corporation stated that it was doing all it could to reduce the impact of the disruption on the supply of petroleum products as a result of the NUPENG strike.
In a statement issued yesterday by the acting group general manager, group public affairs division of the NNPC, Mrs Chinwe Agulefo, the Corporation noted that while it is working with relevant stakeholders to ensure quick resolution of the issues, it has in stock over 32 days’ sufficiency of PMS and other petroleum products.