If NUPENG launches an industrial action tomorrow, it will underscore the need for Nigeria to pass Antitrust acts.
Dangote flooding the roads with enough CNG trucks appears legitimate, but so are other moves big money can make to wipe off competition. The general public is usually not sensitive to this but the government must always be alert to it. We cannot allow big money to dominate everywhere and block off competition.
The most famous antitrust initiatives in modern times began with the attempt of Microsoft to shut out other browsers from its Windows. I think it was Windows 7 back then. Microsoft wanted everyone running Windows to use only Internet Explorer, the proprietary browser bundled with Windows and all other browsers were shut out. The US government stepped on and cleaned the unholy bundling. The EU later launched a similar antitrust proceeding against Microsoft soon after.
But before then has come up the massive monopoly of Standard Oil in the United States in which a single business controlled 90 per cent of American petroleum fossil energy industry. The Supreme Court found against Standard Oil and pronounced it an illegal monopoly. The company was broken up into 34 separate companies, including Standard Oil of New Jersey (Exxon), Standard Oil of New York (Mobil), and Standard Oil of California (Chevron). Many of these companies later recombined to form modern energy giants like ExxonMobil and Chevron.
Consumers’ interests may seem to be served by monopolies like Dangote’ because of the immediate result of lower pump prices. However, such honeymoons never last and the public will soon find that it is losing billions in investments that were shut out long-term.
The government has the duty to sit down and evaluate this scenario long term and take actions necessary for the protection of the public, especially smaller businesses. Conglomerates never serve the interests of everyday people on the long run and anyone who pursues this line of thought further especially in the light of history will agree that the Nigerian Parliament has to formulate laws breaking up the Dangote group not long from now.
We need to break up other monopolies too like the railway, for example. The Marapco monopoly should have been struck hard decades back by laying on it discriminatory import duties that other upcoming generator importers aren’t subjected to. Lack of competition create monster businesses that come back with implications for politics and they will ultimately enslave the people and more or less own the nation.
John Ogunlela, Writer on Facebook
