Workers strike paralyzes Nigeria, Africa's largest economy

ABUJA, Nigeria

A nationwide strike by workers in Nigeria has paralyzed economic activities in the country at a time when it is grappling with high inflation.

Members of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) and Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) will be going on the total and indefinite strike to demand the government fulfill an agreement on measures to address high transportation, food, medicine, and petrol prices following the removal of an oil subsidy, TUC President Festus Osifo told Anadolu.

"Aside the government failure to implement our agreement, we are asking the government to bring the perpetrators of assault on NLC president to justice. The NLC president was in Imo State to address the non-payment of workers' salaries and entitlements, but he was assaulted, beaten by policemen and things linked to the state government," Osifo added.

Operations have ground to a halt at banks and other financial institutions, seaports, the country's state-owned Railway Corporation, the petroleum sector, and public schools in most parts of the country on Wednesday, the second day of the strike.

Musa Njadvara, an economist and financial correspondent with UK-based daily The Guardian, said the productivity of the Africa's largest economy would suffer due to the strike.

"The ongoing strike will further compound the ailing economy,

"It will worsen the current inflation because supply will drop sharply against high demand. Nigeria will lose more money. This will affect credibility of our economy in the eye of foreign investors," he told Anadolu.

Rasaki Dauda, who heads the Department of Economics at Redeemer's University in the southwestern Nigerian town of Ede, warned that the strike would have a huge impact on Nigeria's oil production. He said output may decline if the shutdown continues.