Buhari sets Nigeria backwards
Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has said that it will be too early to speculate on the plans of the next administration under All Progressives Congress(APC).
President of NLC, Comrade Joe Ajaero, who spoke yesterday during a familiarisation visit to one of the affiliate unions, the Amalgamated Union of Public Corporation, Civil Service Technical and Recreational Services Employees (AUPCTRE), noted that as far as organised labour was concerned, there is nothing to indicate that the next government APC will be significantly different from the outgoing one.
According to the labour movement, administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, in the past eight years was married by retrogression in almost all indices of development in the country.
He said: “So the new government we’re still waiting to get their own agenda because if we follow it from the manifesto of the APC, they will follow what Buhari has done and if its underdevelopment that they are sustaining, then there is a problem.
“So, NLC will wait for the agenda of the new government before we comment. You can see that parties no longer implement their manifesto and it like all the parties lack manifesto, that is why we are worried we should be able to hold them accountable, to say this is your party manifesto, this is what you are doing, it is not in line with your parents
manifesto.”
“We will wait for them to come up with the agenda, and we’ll look at it,” he said.
With regard to the fate of Labour Party, NLC said the party remained its favoured party with which it hopes to enthrone good governance in the country.
When asked to respond to the accusation by the former Spokesman of Tinubu Presidential Campaign, Bayo Onanuga that NLC is working to truncate the inauguration of the next administration, Ajaero described it as cheap blackmail.
He said that people like Bayo Onanuga should stop making enemies for their bosses, adding that the worst thing that will happen to the incoming government is to see organised labour as enemy.
“ We want to plead with the likes of Bayo Onanuga, some satanic information being circulated by the Imo State government, they are now using some names to push out publications against the NLC and its leadership. We want to advise them that they’re crossing the red line and they’re creating enemies for the incoming administration.
“The worst thing that will happen to their bosses is for them to see us as enemies. If what they are praying for, they get it. It will not be good. All of you remember when Obasanjo government accused Adams Oshiomole of forming parallel government, we have not gotten. We’ll get there one day because we will do our work without fear or favour, without contradiction,” he said.
Ajaero said what the NLC expects is good governance and that things will change and Nigerians will enjoy and that this level of underdevelopment will stop.
However, the NLC president regretted that Nigerian workers have been subjected to hardship.
“What we are seeing is that Nigeria is under-developing and we talk about under development we mean that Nigeria is receding from where they met it. At the point that President Buhari took over, Nigeria has been receding.
“For instance in the power sector, the country was producing between 4,000MW and 5,000 MW of electricity averagely. But in the past eight years, as at this morning, Nigeria producing about 3,000MW. That is recession, moving back from where we were. Again, ASUU strike used to last about three months but under President Buhari’s watch, we started recording eight months of ASUU strike. We are receding,” he said.
Ajaero also spoke on the involvement of the labour movement in politics, saying that organised labour was compelled to venture into politics and form Labour Party because its interest in ensuring that Nigeria is rescued from corruption and bad governance
He said that NLC is determined to continue to support LP until it becomes a very formidable political force in the country.
He said that the congress will push for retired labour union members to seek for political offices using LP as their launch pad.
According to Ajaero, the workers are suffering a lot of neglect especially in the states, adding that it is high time the leadership of organised labour woke up to their responsibility and do a fight to rescue workers.
“We ‘re equally trying to tell them to be more politically conscious. We’re in politics now. The NLC is involved in politics with the LP, and I will not shy away from it.
“The LP belong to the trade unions and that is it all over the world. It is our party and we will maintain it and it is because of bad governance that we’re thinking of alternative to other political parties because we couldn’t join other parties and we didn’t say everybody must die in LP. If you want to belong to PDP, or APC we didn’t restrain people.
“When people try to blackmail us that we are trying to truncate their inauguration, that is the cheapest blackmail. If we want to do anything, we come out openly and announce it to the world,” he said.
Ajaero also spoke against the proposed amendment of the labour laws, alleging that the government did not carry leadership of the unions along. He said that if the government goes ahead as it done by submitting the bill to the National Assembly without getting the input of organised labour, the workers will reject it. In addition, Ajaero expressed the readiness of the labour centre to join hands with its affiliate to confront the management of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) over a dispute.
