Fuel Price Hike: Reps ask NLC to suspend planned strike, to meet labour leaders

Fuel Price Hike: Reps ask NLC to suspend planned strike, to meet labour leaders
May 16, 2016Hassan Adebayo and Samuel Ogundipe

Speaker, House of Reps, Yakubu Dogara.
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The House of Representatives has urged the Nigerian Labour Congress to suspend its planned strike over the hike in the price of petrol.
The lawmakers, after their meeting with the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu, during a special session on Monday, set up an ad hoc committee, comprising heads of relevant committees, including those of downstream, upstream and Navy, to meet with Labour and government.
The ad hoc committee is headed by the House Whip, Alhassan Doguwa (APC, Kano).
The motion urging workers to suspend the planned strike was moved by Nicholas Ossai (APC).
The committee has five days to conclude its assignment.
Although PDP members, who earlier opposed Mr. Kachikwu’s admittance to the green chamber, loudly opposed the motion by voicing “nay”, Speaker Yakubu Dogara ruled that the “ayes have it”.
Thereafter, PDP lawmakers from the House and the Senate went into a closed-door meeting, presided over by Senate Minority Leader, Godswill Akpabio.
The reason for the meeting remained unclear but some members said the lawmakers were discussing a robust opposition response to the fuel price hike.
In their dramatic opposition to Mr. Kachikwu’s admittance, several PDP lawmakers had waved Nigerian flag, singing “all we are saying…save Nigeria”, plunging the House into a rowdy session before order was restored.
The House then dissolved into a closed-door session and later resolved to interact with Mr. Kachikwu.
Briefing the lawmakers in plenary, Mr. Kachikwu said if fuel price was not increased, long queues would return fully, and that the Federation Account Allocations Committee would have no money to distribute to the federation units.