LAGOS — The Dangote refinery has assured Nigerians that there will be no petrol shortage despite an ongoing strike by fuel tanker drivers, which has begun to draw both domestic and international support.
The strike, launched Monday by the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG), comes as the refinery—the largest in Africa—moves to deploy its own fleet of drivers to distribute petrol nationwide.
“There is no fuel shortage, everything is going on,” refinery spokesman Anthony Chiejina told AFP on Tuesday, adding that talks were underway between the union, the government, and the company.
Opened last year with a capacity of 650,000 barrels per day, the Dangote refinery has sharply reduced petrol costs for consumers and disrupted decades-old practices in Nigeria’s oil sector, which has long suffered from corruption and mismanagement of state-owned refineries.
However, its rapid dominance has raised monopoly concerns, particularly as it prepares to introduce thousands of compressed natural gas-powered trucks to deliver fuel across the country—a move delayed by logistical challenges.
The new system has unsettled Nigeria’s traditional fuel distribution market, where more than 20,000 diesel-powered tankers have operated for decades.
Union president Williams Akporeha accused Dangote of undermining workers’ rights, alleging that the company’s new drivers were being hired on the condition that they not join a union. “What Dangote has shown over time is that he’s not prepared to have workers that will have a say in his employment,” Akporeha told Arise News on Tuesday.
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The strike has won backing from the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), as well as international groups including IndustriALL Global Union in Switzerland and the International Lawyers Assisting Workers (ILAW) Network in Washington.
Dangote, however, has rejected the allegations. “It’s not true… nobody has done that and nobody ever has. This is cheap blackmail,” Chiejina said.
