Coalition of Civil Society Organisations and Political Parties for Good Governance (COSOSAP) has said that the planned strike by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) scheduled to commence on August 2 will further aggravate the suffering of the citizens.
Its National Coordinator, Dr. Lillian Ogbole, stated this while addressing a press conference Thursday in Abuja.
While acknowledging the hardship caused by the removal of fuel subsidy, the coalition called for patience and understanding from all Nigerians in order to an end to the retrogressive and corrupt subsidy regime to pave the way for robust and competitive open market operations.
Ogbole stressed that the oil subsidy regime can no longer be sustained as it constituted a source of monumental corruption and a clog in the wheels of the Nation’s progress in the last forty five years.
She urged those opposed to the policy to exercise a little more patience and support the government to create the enabling environment that will improve the living standard of the larger majority of Nigerians.
The Coalition called all major stakeholders in the petroleum sector to play by the rules to ensure that the effort to set the Nigerian economy on the path of growth and development is not frustrated and truncated.
Ogbole stated: “It is worthy of note therefore to mention emphatically that Nigeria Labour Congress cannot roll in the path of any form of industrial action either by way of protest or nationwide strike as this will further escalate more crisis and problem than what is presently obtainable.
“No matter the perspective the situation is perceived from, Nigerians must be guided by the overriding national interest which is the continuous survival of our citizens under one indivisible entity.
“It is true that Nigerians desire and deserve to buy petrol at a cheaper rate, but again it is equally true that neither our economy, nor any other economy in the world can bear the brunt of the mega corruption associated with the fuel subsidy regime as was obtainable in Nigeria.”
Ogbole explained that the only way to ensure Nigeria does not go the way of failed states like Venezuela and Sri Lanka was to obliterate the fuel subsidy regime.
She saks this accounted for why the last administration ended the fuel subsidy regime in the twilight of its tenure as evident in their refusal to make appropriation for fuel subsidy for the month of June 2023 and even subsequent months..