Buhari, governors to discuss fuel pricing issue Thursday – Ngige

President Muhammadu Buhari and the state governors, on Thursday, will discuss fuel pricing issue. Senator Chris Ngige, the Minister of Labour and Employment, announced this Sunday night.

It was disclosed after a bipartite meeting of the Federal Government and the organised labour at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

In a journalists briefing on their resolves, Ngige said the labour had scrutinized the report of the Technical Committee on Premium Motor Spirit Pricing Framework.

It was approved at the last meeting and made its recommendations together with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.

The minister said, “The labour side saw that they were making some points and like I said, it is work in progress. Governors are going to discuss this on Thursday.

“They have discussed this at the National Economic Council and so, everybody is involved because we find ourselves in dire straits. There is no money for subsidy.

“The NNPC has explained: What they are doing is import- dependent. Deregulation is import-dependent but they are doing bulk purchasing. So, they can get discounts.

“They are also using foreign exchange that is discounted for them. They are not buying from the parallel market. So, all these things will be put in basket and a price will emerge from it.”

The minister claimed that the Federal Government has finalised deliberations with the organised labour on the fuel pricing.

On the electricity tariff, Ngige declared that the meeting implemented the report of its Ad-hoc Technical Committee on Electricity Tariffs.

It made a few changes and reformed the committee into an implementation committee, to execute all the suggestions made, as well as mass metering.

“You will start seeing members of the committee with the Minister of Power, going around now and making sure that the DISCOS put meters for people because there are reports that they don’t want to be distributing meters and that they want to be doing bulk billing and estimated billings. So, we don’t want that.

“There is also a resolution as regards gas companies reducing gas pricing for gas sold to power companies, GENCOS and the rest of them so that the price of electricity per unit will go down and the consumers will benefit from it. We have given the marching orders for them to do so,” he said.

In addition, the minister said, “Some paper work has to be done and once that is done, price of electricity will go down and once it goes down, the consumers will benefit.”

He stated that the committee also suggested that those forcefully migrated by distribution companies from lower paying bands C and D to upper bands A and B should petition the National Electricity Regulatory Commission.

“They will be brought back and the DISCO will be sanctioned,” he said.

Meanwhile, Ngige disclosed that the social dialogue between the Federal Government and organised labour has been postponed till April as the two standing committees are still working.

Boss Mustafa, The Secretary to the Federal Government, congratulated the organised labour for their sacrifices during this time of economic difficulty, which has been compensated with Nigeria’s exit from recession in the third quarter of 2020.

The President of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Ayuba Wabba and his Trade Union Congress (TUC) associate, Quadri Olaleye led the organised labour.