Sapa-AFP Abuja

Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan defended his policy of scrapping fuel subsidies in an eleventh-hour attempt on Saturday to prevent a national strike that threatens to shut down the country.

In a speech on national television Jonathan also announced pay cuts for top government officials and slashed foreign trips. He said he had taken the decision to abolish the subsidies because he was determined to leave a “better Nigeria”.

Unions have threatened to stage open-ended general strikes, mass rallies and street protests across the country starting today if the government does not backtrack on its new policy.

The removal of subsidies on January 1 saw petrol prices more than double in a country where the majority of the 160 million people live on less than $2 (R16.34) a day.

Jonathan admitted “these are not easy times. But tough choices have to be made to safeguard the economy.

“I feel the pain that you all feel,” he said in the address to the nation. “We must act in the public interest, no matter how tough, for the pains of today cannot be compared to the benefits of tomorrow.

“The truth is that we are all faced with two basic choices… either we deregulate and survive economically, or we continue with a subsidy regime that will continue to undermine our economy.”

Jonathan, whose government has increasingly come under attack for excessive spending, said top government officials would from this year take a 25 percent pay cut, while foreign trips would be reduced.

Unions were unfazed by his speech, vowing that the strike would go ahead as planned until subsidies were restored.