Nigerian umbrella workers' union on Wednesday held an emergency meeting and said it will decide how to protest a recent 30 percent hike in fuel prices over the weekend.

"We will meet with other organizations Friday to Monday," Owei Lakemfa, spokesman for the Nigeria Labor Congress (NLC), told Xinhua from Abuja, Nigeria's capital. A decision on how to resist the hike, probably a general strike, is expected to be made after the talks, he added.

Uyop Chris, a senior official of the union, also confirmed that there will be a meeting with other civil organizations Friday in Lagos, Nigeria's largest city. "The National Executive Council of the NLC met today and condemned the increase in fuel prices and decided to fight it," he said.

Both of them said they did not discuss any oil production disruption in OPEC member Nigeria, Africa's top oil producer at Wednesday's meeting in Abuja.

The fear of the disruption of Nigeria's oil production or exports by a full-scale strike came as light sweet crude for October delivery hit a new record of 70.85 US dollars per barrels in New York on Tuesday.

Last week, Nigeria's petrol price went up from around 50 naira (38 US cents) to 65 (49 US cents) per liter last week, the tenth increase in fuel prices since President Olusegun Obasanjo took office in 1999.

Obasanjo says that price increases are inevitable in view of the tightened government spending and deregulation policy introduced two years ago that meant long-standing government fuel subsidies will be abolished gradually.

"Not doing so will be economically unsustainable," he told Nigerians during a television chat program last week, adding Nigeria's state-run oil firm cannot afford the subsidies any more, which amounted to about 850 million dollars in the last six months.

The 130 million Nigerians, of which over 70 percent live below a dollar per day each, see cheap fuel as a birthright, as the country earns billions of dollars from oil yearly. But in fact, Nigeria has resorted to fuel importation wasting a lot of its oil windfall for years because the country's refining capacity falls short of domestic demand.

Previous fuel price rises had resulted in sit-at-home protest for days but did not impact on the country's oil production or exports.

Source: Xinhua