The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has criticised the Federal Government for enforcing Bretton Woods policies, stating that subsidy removal and rising tariffs are crippling Nigerians.
“They keep on emasculating us through stupid taxes. It will come to a point when people can pay but they won’t pay,” NLC spokesman Benson Upah said on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme on Thursday.
The labour union official opposed the Nigerian Communications Commission’s (NCC) recent announcement of a 50% telecom tariff hike and a proposed 5% increase in data and call costs.
He affirmed that the nationwide protest scheduled for Tuesday, February 4, 2025, would proceed as planned to express the union’s strong opposition to the tariff increase.
Upah said, “This rally is to halt this mindless tariff increase. And if by any chance there has to be an increase at all, 5%, given the fact of our situation that there have been increases across board.
“But now to say 50%, it is not going to work. Where will the ordinary Nigerians be at the end of the day when we have energy tariff increases?
“The manufacturers are groaning, the middle-class people are groaning. The ordinary Nigerians on the streets can’t even afford to turn on the lights in their sitting rooms. When taxes are low, more people than when you have high taxes.”
The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have long pushed for energy subsidy removal and naira flotation, arguing that Nigeria’s failure to implement these policies has fueled severe inflation.
After taking office in May 2023, President Bola Tinubu, a former Lagos governor, scrapped the petrol subsidy and floated the naira. As a result, petrol prices surged over fourfold, rising from under N200 per litre to over N1,100 in many areas. Meanwhile, the naira plummeted from around N700/$ to N1,600.
This triggered a sharp rise in food and commodity inflation, plunging Nigerians into what is arguably the worst cost-of-living crisis since independence over six decades ago.
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