NLC President, Abdulwaheed omar
Hammed Shittu
Members of staff of the National Union of Electricity Employees under Jebba Hydro Electric Plc Monday staged a peaceful protest over the non-payment of their entitlements by the Federal Government following the alleged plan to privatise the company.
Addressing newsmen in Jebba, Kwara State, the Chairman, Generation and Transmission, Shiroro/Kainji, Abiodun Balogun, said government deceived the workers that they have paid certain monies to them.
According to him,” All they said in papers are just propaganda. There is nobody in PHCN that is against privatisation but our entitlements should be paid.”
He said,”In the whole three PHCN formations, we are signing it. In the power sectors, we are not signing. We want the government to know that if they did not follow due process by consulting with the labour leaders, we are not going to accept and we are not going to guarantee peace in this place’.
The chairman stated that, “People have worked 20 and 35 years and you want to remove them without paying them their entitlements. We are not accepting it. For the past 14 months the PHCN national leaders had been negotiation with the government without any meaningful result”.
Balogun added,”We are not trying to frustrate the efforts of the government to ensure uninterrupted power supply to Nigerians. In fact we are committed to ensuring better power supply for Nigerians. The truth is there to see. The workers are always on duty. Even now that call for some members out for strike, there is still electricity supply.
It is not true that the workers are frustrating government’s efforts. Government is not honest in telling Nigerians the truth of what is happening in the power sector. We are interested in Nigerians enjoying more power supply. We cannot do anything that will jeopardise the government efforts. What we are asking is that we should be giving the right pay for the job that we have done for the authority”.
He stressed that, “We are calling on Nigerians to listen to our cries and at the same time, calling on the government, let the minister tell Nigerians the true
position in the power sector. Let him not come out and deceive
Nigerians. They have deceived most Nigerians that they have paid certain monies to us and that we are still trying t protest. It is not so.”