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NIGERIA Rioting erupts in Nigeria capital Posted Mon, 07 Jul 2003 Riots erupted in Nigeria's commercial capital Lagos on Monday as President Olusegun Obasanjo made unions a new offer on fuel prices in a bid to end an eight-day-old general strike. Street thugs mingled with strikers as gangs spilled out into the streets of the city, burned vehicles, set up barricades and clashed with heavily armed squads of riot police. One witness said he had seen dead bodies in the large, busy Oshodi street market. An AFP journalist was unable to confirm any deaths, but saw agitated police firing bursts from assault rifles. Another AFP employee was unable to leave his home because a street gang known in Lagos as "area boys" had taken control of the streets around his housing estate. "We call them hoodlums because they are not really protesters, they are thugs and area boys," Lagos police spokesperson Emmanuel Ighodalo told AFP, confirming widespread unrest. "It's like they've left Abuja to come to cause serious problems in Lagos," he said. The most serious clashes since the strike was launched last week have been in and around the capital, Abuja. The spokesperson said that police were attempting to disperse the protesters and to protect strike-breakers from harassment and violence as they made their way to work. Meanwhile strike leader Adams Oshiomhole, president of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), said in a televised interview that labour would meet on Monday to discuss a new offer from government. "I have called a new meeting of the (NLC) to come and discuss a new offer made by the government," he told Africa Independent Television. Sources close to the negotiations told AFP that Oshiomhole had talked with Obasanjo overnight and that the pair had discussed reducing the petrol price to 34 naira (26 cents/22 euro). The NLC called the strike after Obasanjo abolished subsidies on fuel and hiked price caps by more than 50 percent. The pump price of petrol shot up from 26 naira to 40, sparking public anger. Hopes had been high that the NLC might call off the strike on Sunday, but Oshiomhole ordered the action to continue into a second week, insisting the price must come down to 32 naira. So far the NLC has failed to make good on its threat to shut down Nigeria's oil production and export, the world's fifth biggest source of crude and the mainstay of the national economy. Oil markets are watching keenly for any sign that the action might disrupt Nigeria's exports. The strike has suffered from the defection of white-collar unions -- including oil industry senior staff whose umbrella body called Saturday for its members to return to work. Obasanjo wants to solve the first great crisis of his second term swiftly, not least because US President George W. Bush is due to arrive in Nigeria on Friday for a state visit. But as the dispute draws closer to an end, bitterness and hardship are rising. Banks, markets, shops and public transport have been closed or disrupted for eight days, and many Nigerians are hungry or broke. Among those targeted in Monday's unrest, witnesses said, were "Okada riders" motorcycle-taxi drivers many of whom have worked through the strike, profiting from the lack of buses. Despite being Africa's largest exporter of crude oil, with an OPEC quota of more than two million barrels per day, Nigeria suffers from crippling shortages of petrol, diesel and kerosene. Obasanjo believes deregulation will lure in private capital to refurbish Nigeria's decrepit refineries, increase imports and generate competition. He also argues that the 250-billion naira ($1.95-billion/€1.7-billion) his government spends annually on the fuel subsidy would be better used on health and education. But many in Nigeria regard cheap fuel as a birthright, the only tangible benefit the nation's 126 million largely impoverished people get from their country's vast oil reserves.
AFP
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