Public-sector employees represented by the Trade Union Side of the Joint National Public Service Negotiating Council (JNPSNC) have appealed to President Bola Tinubu for urgent measures to ease the deepening economic pressure on workers. In a letter to the President, they called on the Federal Government to bring petrol down to N500 per litre, grant an immediate wage award, and increase salaries and allowances throughout the public service.
The unions also requested the prompt formation of a committee to negotiate a replacement National Minimum Wage before January 2027. They said petrol, which has recently climbed to N1,430 per litre or more in some areas, had intensified the cost-of-living crisis. The workers set Wednesday, September 30, 2026, as the deadline for the government to respond, warning that the continuing hardship was generating visible tension among employees and the wider Nigerian population.
They said the termination of the fuel subsidy three years ago had sent petrol prices sharply higher and created knock-on increases in the cost of essential goods across the economy. In the JNPSNC’s view, the resulting conditions had made daily life increasingly difficult for workers, while food handouts could not provide a lasting answer to the crisis.
The workers said distributing items including rice, Indomie noodles, vegetable oil and garri amounted to exposing Nigerians to poverty rather than solving it. They described such assistance as a temporary and ineffective measure that was unsustainable, unavailable to most people and largely restricted to political allies.
They argued that the more durable response would be to cut petrol prices to N500 per litre, saying the reduction would produce broad multiplier effects throughout the economy.
