Nigeria seeks to curb union power

The latest petrol prices rise was scaled back after a general strike

Nigeria's powerful umbrella trade union body will be broken up, the president has said.

President Olusegun Obasanjo said this would introduce "democracy" to the Nigeria Labour Congress.

The NLC has called general strikes against fuel prices rises three times in the past nine months - most recently earlier this month.

But Mr Obasanjo said the unions were overstepping their powers in trying to change government policy.

'Angry president'

Mr Obasanjo said he had set up the NLC when he was a military ruler in the 1970s, but it should now be decentralised.

"We forced the people to belong to the union because we were military. We are now in a democracy and we want Nigerians to do things democratically, but labour does not want to be democratic," he said.

Obasanjo wants the unions to be 'democratic'

But NLC leader Adams Oshiomhole said the union federation would not be broken up.

"The right to form and join unions is guaranteed by the constitution and cannot be repudiated by any president, no matter how powerful or angry he might be," he said.

Mr Obasanjo has scrapped fuel subsidies in Nigeria, Africa's major oil exporter, and petrol prices have more than doubled since he was elected in 1999.

But the latest rise was scaled back earlier this month following a general strike, called by the NLC.