Naira, fuel crisis: Informal workers ask for a stop to sufferings

Workers under the Federation of Informal Workers’ Organizations of Nigeria (FIWON), have said the current cash crunch and fuel scarcity have put the lives of the workers into unprecedented suffering and contrived agony.

The union’s Secretary General, Mr Gbenga Komolafe in a statement, therefore, urged the authorities at all levels to act immediately to stop the sufferings.

“This situation has become an aggravated burden on hard working Nigerians in the informal sectors of the national economy as productive activities become very difficult and in some instances, impossible.

“The added collateral damage can be glimpsed from the sporadic outburst of anger by helpless Nigerians on the streets of our major cities in the last few days,“ he said.

The general secretary also urged President Muhammadu Buhari and all law enforcement agencies to accelerate the arrest of defaulters in the financial institutions profiting from the present misery Nigerians are going through.

“We also demand that the Central Bank of Nigeria should make the new naira notes available in a way that every naira can be tracked through the commercial banks.

“Enough of this contrived suffering imposed on poor working people who were already on edge as a result of the disastrous management of the economy in the last few decades,“ Komolafe said.

He also called for immediate move to overhaul the governance of the oil and gas sector, root out embedded cronyism and corruption.

The union leader also wants immediate investments in modular refining of petroleum products as a stop gap measure, to meet domestic energy and raw materials needs.