Business
Car Workers End Strike In South Africa
A South African union
representing car workers has agreed a new pay deal, ending a month-long strike that has crippled the industry.
The British Broadcasting Corporation reported that the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa accepted a 10 per cent pay rise this year and eight per cent in the next two years.
The strike in the car components industry caused severe disruption, especially to exports.
Last week BMW said it had stopped “all future plans” to expand in South Africa because of the industrial action.
Under the deal, pay at small-to-medium-sized car parts firms will only raise wages by nine per cent in the first year, followed by eight per cent in the subsequent two years.
“The strike was very hard for us,” Irvin Jim, the general secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa, told reporters.
The car components’ strike followed industrial action by workers at car manufacturers themselves, which hit production at BMW, Ford, Nissan and General Motors and cost an estimated $2 billion in lost output.
Contributory Pension Scheme contributors rise to 5.6 million.
About 5.6 million workers have registered under the Contributory Pension Scheme, according to the National Pension Commission (PenCom).
Latest figures from the commission revealed that the scheme had also generated a large pool of investible funds of over N3.5 trillion invested in various financial instruments, a huge growth when compared with estimated pension liabilities in the public sector prior to the reform of the industry in 2004.
The Acting Director-General, PenCom, Mrs. Chinelo Anohu-Amazu, said the process of the major amendment of the Pension Reform Act, 2004 was currently at the final stages of consideration by the National Assembly.
She said the commission had recently organised an interactive workshop in order to acquaint Judges of the superior courts with the basic understanding of the CPS to enable them adjudicate on pension matters effectively.
PenCom, she added, had also established a call centre for use by members of the public so as to enhance its service delivery through an efficient complaints resolution process.
According to her, the commission embarked on the establishment of offices in all the six geo-political zones of the country in order to decentralise its activities and bring them closer to the contributors and retirees.
“With our presence in the South-West zone now, we expect all stakeholders to avail themselves of our services by visiting our office to make enquiries, lodge complaints and seek enlightenment on the Contributory Pension Scheme,” Anohu-Amazu said.
The acting director-general said due to the commission’s renewed focus on efficient service delivery; it had sought to reduce the need for contributors and retirees to travel from various parts of the country to Abuja before accessing its services.
The presence in the different parts of the country, she added, would facilitate closer interaction with the state pension offices by assisting them to comply with the CPS.
Some Commercial drivers in Port Harcourt have said that the Federal Government’s N1,350 fuel discount is yet to reduce their daily operating cost.
A cross session of commercial drivers who spoke to The Tide correspondents in Port Harcourt said they are yet to feel the impact of the government discount, adding that most filling stations in the city are even selling above the pump price
A driver Jude Ogbo who operates the mile 1 Rumuokoro axis of Port Harcourt said plies the discount has not reflected in his daily fuel expenses.
“Since the discount was announced, many filling stations still sell at the old price. When you go there, you discover they sell you two litres at the price of one. For now, we have not seen any reduction,”_ he said.
Another commercial driver, Comrade Ishmael Uzeho who operates within the Port Harcourt metropolis, said the discount is not being implemented across the country.
“How has the discount affected us? I will say it has not. Many stations are not working. Only NNPC is working and that is just one person in the whole country. If government really wants to help, let the fuel price go down properly,”_ he said.
Uzeho added that if the price of fuel goes down, transport fares will also go down. He noted that his route fare has remained at N500.
On his part, Mr. Moses Dapa, Supervisor at Sam Jaja Foundation Transport Company, said the company has not increased its fares despite the high cost of fuel.
“We are still running normal price. We charge N2,000 and N5,000 depending on the destination. We will not increase our price. I don’t know about other parks, but for Sam Jaja, we are maintaining normal price,”_ Dapa said.
He appealed to passengers to understand that drivers are not using high fuel price as an excuse to charge excessive fares.
Other drivers who spoke said the federal government should monitor the NNPCL retail stations to ensure that the directive is implemented.
Recalled that The Federal Government in abid to reduce transportation cost in the country had announced a 30-day margin discount at NNPC Retail stations across the country from October 1 to 31,
However investigation revealed that the policy is yet to affect transportation cost in the country.
By; Stephens Sopakriba and Saint Davies
In a press statement released to The Tide’s source on Friday in Abuja, the group said Nigeria had a significant resource advantage due to its vast natural gas reserves.
“At a time when global energy markets face unprecedented volatility and rising operational costs, Nigeria stands on a massive resource advantage with its vast natural gas reserves,” the group said.
Highlighting this potential, Alfa Designs urged the nation to move past complaints over energy costs and aggressively embrace Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) as a sustainable engine for economic growth.
While federal policy adjustments have sought to cushion the impact of global energy shocks, industry experts emphasised that long-term relief hinges on a rapid, nationwide transition to gas.
“Transitioning away from expensive traditional petroleum products promises to ease the financial burden on ordinary citizens.
“It will also reposition Nigeria as an attractive industrial hub capable of drawing foreign direct investment and driving job creation,” it said.
To demonstrate the practical feasibility of this transition, the group said it recently partnered with a global Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) to lower the entry barriers for commercial drivers.
“By negotiating directly with the manufacturer, we reduced the total cost of acquiring and installing a CNG conversion kit for commercial tricycles (commonly known as Keke NAPEP) from up to N700,000 down to under N450,000.”
The group said this shift offers dramatic immediate financial benefits for local operators, with petrol currently selling at roughly N1,390 per liter.
It said that, in comparison, at a CNG equivalent price of about N98 per liter, a daily commercial driver using 10 liters of fuel reduces its daily energy expenditure from N13,900 to N3,980.
“This represents a daily net savings of N9,920, or more than 71 per cent.
“Over a standard 26-day working month, drivers save over N257,000, allowing them to fully recover the cost of the CNG conversion in less than 46 operational days.”
The company further stated that when scaled nationally, the economic implications are monumental.
“Nigeria consumes approximately 50 million liters of gasoline daily, costing roughly N69.5 billion per day.
“A nationwide 71 per cent reduction in fuel expenditure would generate daily national energy savings of N49.6 billion.
“On an annualised basis, this shift equates to approximately N18.1 trillion, or $13.5 billion, kept within the domestic economy.”
The group added that those recurring national savings would offer a vital mechanism to help address Nigeria’s estimated $2.3 trillion infrastructure deficit.
It said reinvesting those funds into the economy helps eliminate the 30 to 40 per cent operational overhead currently consumed by imported fossil fuels.
“The resulting boost to corporate margins expands the national tax base, generates reliable user-fee revenues to make major transit projects bankable, and creates a self-sustaining financial cycle,” it said.
