UPDATE 2-Rising oil boosts Nigeria's 2021 budget but creates fuel price headache

(Adds they do not plan to pay subsidies and comment on WTO
naira concerns)
ABUJA, March 22 (Reuters) - Nigeria is optimistic about
funding its 2021 budget due to rising oil prices, but is engaged
in a "tussle" with organised labour over how it can end fuel
subsidies without harming the poor, Finance Minister Zainab
Ahmed said on Monday.
Oil prices, which are averaging around $10 per barrel above
the level projected for the 2021 budget, are good for the
nation's revenues, she told journalists, but are complicating
plans to end costly fuel subsidies.
"We made recommendation to deregulate the pricing of
(gasoline). But we have a stalemate with labour," she said,
calling the oil price rise a "double edged sword".
The government promised an end to the fuel subsidies last
year, which have cost the government billions of dollars, but
rising oil prices have complicated the effort.
State oil company NNPC is negotiating with organised labour
to find a way to allow petrol prices to float without unduly
harming the nation's poor and working class. Ahmed said they did not plan to pay subsidies, and that
officials hope the cost of importing fuel does not reduce NNPC's
remittances to the federal government.
Oil prices are averaging around $50 per barrel, above the
$40 per barrel projected in the 13.6 trillion naira ($35.74
billion) budget document.
Ahmed also said discussions were ongoing over concerns
brought to the World Trade Organization regarding Nigeria's
foreign exchange management. She declined to elaborate beyond
say the discussions were "a work in progess".
The WTO is concerned about how Nigeria's foreign exchange
management has been used to support manufacturing, exports and
imports, its director-general Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala - a former
Nigerian finance minister who took the top job at the WTO this
month - said on Monday.