Nigeria's gasoline tanker drivers suspended a nationwide strike that had sparked panic fuel-buying after the government pledged to lower the cost of diesel, a senior union official said Monday.
"We suspended our action on Saturday night after promises from the oil minister that he would find a way to subsidies fuel prices," said Pius Ikechi, the deputy president of the Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas workers.
According to local media report, long lines formed at gasoline stations in the capital Abuja, the commercial hub Lagos and other major Nigerian cities over the weekend as drivers, many of whom waited for several hours in queues and feared the strike would disrupt supplies.
Nigeria is the world's eighth largest crude oil exporter but its four state-owned refineries are not fully operational, costing it some 4 billion U.S. dollars in fuel imports each year.
The union said it would give the government two weeks to come up with a plan to lower diesel prices, which have risen 110 percent in the past few months to around 1.44 U.S dollars per liter.
Nigeria's Minister for petroleum Odein Ajumogobia and Finance Minister Shamsuddeen Usman were expected to meet this week to find ways to increase fuel prices subsidies and stave off another strike.
In June, the government was forced to freeze domestic gasoline prices for another six months to prevent mass protests by workers and civil groups.
Source:Xinhua
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