The Nation Newspaper

Category: Labour

  • Workers who will survive in future, by HoS

    Only the worker with the right skill set and knowledge will survive in a workplace of the future, which will be ruled by technology, Lagos State Head of Service (HoS) Mrs Folashade Adesoye has said.

    She spoke at the flag-off of an induction and orientation training for the newly employed 1,500 local government officers held at the Lagos State Public Service Staff Development Centre (PSSDC), Magodo, Lagos.

    Mrs. Adesoye said as ambassadors and officers of the government, the new workers must distinguish themselves, learn and abide by the civil service rules and comport themselves decently at all times.

    She said: “You must be a team player, and be ready to serve members of the public without fear or favour. You must put aside all the stories you have heard about the local government and be ready to join  hands with others to change the poor perception of council workers. Be hard working, ask questions, know your roles and responsibilities.”

    She said now is the time to stop dreaming and start envisioning and working on their career path as with the unified civil service, adding that the sky is the limit to how far they can rise in the state civil service.

    Adesoye, who said she served in the local government system for 25 years before moving to the mainstream and still got to the pinnacle of the service as the number one civil servant, urged the new officers not to look down on their employment as civil service is one in the state.

    Earlier, Local Government Service Commission (LGSECOM) Chairman,  Mr Babatunde Rotinwa, said government business, especially at the local government level, is no longer for the lazy, adding that officials from the commission will soon begin to move round to randomly check on the officers with the intention of flushing out those who may be seen to be unwilling to work

    He said: “As  ambassador of the government wherever  you may be posted to serve, you must pay attention to your looks. You must be decently dressed. Pay attention to your looks; don’t take local government work with levity, remember that if you don’t play your part, your local government may not generate the internal revenue that we need to pay you and other workers at that level and always be a team player. Be prompt at work and always be at your duty post.”

    Rotinwa, a former Head of Service in the state, said the commission would be on the lookout for those who are serious and be willing to work with only those who are ready to partner with the Akinwunmi Ambode government in creatively serving the people of the state.

    PSSDC’s Director-General Mr Ajose-Harrison, who said translating visions and plans of any government is an indicator of successful governance said the PSSDC would ensure that policies, strategies and reforms agenda of the government is properly internalised by the workers.

  • PenCom chief: Micro-pension scheme to hit 30m by 2024

    The micro-pension scheme is expected to help raise pension contributors to 20 million by next year and 30 million by 2024.

    The Acting Director-General, National  Pension Commission (PenCom), Mrs. Aisha Dahir-Umar, who spoke in Lagos, also stated that micro-pension scheme is expected to generate about N3 trillion to the pension assets, while mobilising about 12 million contributors within five years.

    She said: “Micro pension scheme is targeted at self-employed people, especially those with irregular income, usually in the informal sector and are largely financially uninformed, with limited or no access to financial services, especially pension plan.

    “This segment, which is estimated to be 70 per cent of the country’s population, largely exists in Nigeria as artisans and self-employed persons.”

    She said PenCom  recovered pension contributions and interests totalling N1.34 billion from defaulting employers during the third quarter of 2017, adding that affected employers were issued appropriate notice to remit the outstanding pension contributions.

    “During the quarter, N1.34 billion was recovered,  bringing the total recoveries made since inception of the recovery agents’ activities in 2012 to N13.58 billion, “ she said.

    On pension contributions within the period, she said the total monthly pension contribution by contributors from the public and private sectors into their Retirement Savings Accounts (RSA) was N4.38 trillion.

    This, she said, showed an increase of N135.22 billion, representing 3.18 per cent of total contributions as at the end of the previous quarter.

    She added that about  N39.83 million was refunded to the contributors, while the sum of N127.13 million, representing contributions made by the Federal Government on their behalf was returned to the contributory pension account.

    She commended President Muhammudu Buhari for attending to retirees’ well-being by settling accrued pension rights for that period.

  • 720,000 jobs coming from senior citizen centre

    Over 720,000 jobs are expected to be created through the creation of National Senior Citizens Centre.

    President Muhammadu Buhari, at the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in January, signed into law the National Senior Citizens Centre Act 2018 and the Legislative Houses (Power and Privileges) 2018.

    The Act established the National Senior Citizens Centre to cater for the needs of the senior citizens.

    Speaking at the graduation of over 700 American Caregiver Association (ACA) trained and certified professionals in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, President, Ghalp Caregivers Academy (GCA), a non- governmental organisation, Dr. David Olalekan, said the Federal Government must march its policy on the importance of caring for the citizens with action by establishing those centres.

    According to him,  each state is mandated to establish homes in all the local governments, adding that each state may need up to 20,000 caregivers to work in the homes as well as in the hospitals.

    He said:“We want to start with Oyo State here, and we believe that if we get the opportunity to train people, who are looking for jobs, they can be absorbed into all these homes and that will be taking a big burden off the shoulder of government in the area of job creation.

    “In Oyo State alone, over 20,000 can be engaged, some of them will work in the facilities that will be established and some can work in the hospitals  to stand in the gap for doctors and nurses.

    “We believe that it is possible if government, state governors’ wives and other institutions can make it their pet projects.”

    Olalekan said the act has further opened Nigerians to better global opportunity and career in care giving both in Nigeria and outside the country.

    He said Federal Government may need to take the initiative of leading other arms of government in the establishment of facilities for the senior citizens in the country, if the plan must be realistic.

    He said: “With the signing of the bill, which now makes it mandatory for our senior citizens to be catered for just like we have abroad, there is need for special hands in those centres to be created. That alone means over 720,000 jobs could be created annually locally.

    “In the United States, 20,000 caregivers are provided yearly and over 40,000 presently work as caregivers.”

    He explained that Nigerians could actually earn forex through her people working abroad as they would be remitting money back to the country.

    Olalekan advised Nigerians working abroad or those who are about to go outside the country for caregiving or any other official jobs to always consider themselves as ambassadors of the country.

    “I believe that we should have a mind of coming back to build our country. Some years back, Ethiopia, could not boast of anything, but the country today is one of the best in the continent through what her citizens, who went abroad and returned had been able to do,”he stated.

    According to him, the Academy has the franchise to train people in West Africa for ACA certification.

    The special guest at the event, Prof Ifeanyi Prinuel Onyeonoru, a professor of Industrial Relations and Head of Department of Sociology, University of Ibadan, however expressed that insecurity in the country could be traced to loss of the social values of old.

    He said:”The social values of old, of caring for ourselves are not carried along in the course of our development. Boko Haram thrives because there are youths uncared for, who are available to be used. It boils down to parents, the society, to take care of their wards.

    “Human security is a sine qua non for national security. We must care for the vulnerable, if it’s not done now, it will lead to more crisis,”he said.

    Senior Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly Matters (Senate) Sen. Ita Enang, had said the Act allows the establishment of the National Senior Citizens Centres by institutions and three tiers of government in the country to cater for the needs of the senior citizens.

  • The cost of non-passage of PIB, by NUPENG

    About $200 billion has been lost in the last eight years to the non-passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB).

    Former President of the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas workers (NUPENG) Comrade Achese Igwe, who disclosed this at the fourth quadrennial delegates’ conference of the union, in Port Harcourt, said the delay in passing the bill was a disincentive to the  economy as it has stifled direct foreign investment (DFI) into the country. According to him, it has also resulted in the folding of companies.

    Lauding the National Assembly for the passage of the governance component of the PIB, he called on President Muhammadu Buhari to fast-track the bill by assenting to it.

    “We believe that the president shall assent to the bill without delay, now that the National Assembly has harmonised it,”he said.

    He listed PIGB gains to include: restoring investors’ confidence and transparency in the oil and gas sector, employment generation and a virile business climate.

    He, however, faulted the removal of the clause on environmental and host communities’ concerns.

    The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) President,  Comrade Ayuba Wabba, commended NUPENG for a successful congress, whose process he described as transparent.

    He urged the National Assembly to pass the National Minimum Wage Bill to enhance the living standard of workers, cautioning a plot to bring workers’ issue to the concurrent legislative list.

    According to him, such decision will breed crisis. He vowed to mobilise workers to resist any attempt to undermine workers’ prospect by transferring the issue to the concurrent list.

  • ITUC launches recruitment platform for migrant workers

    The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) has launched a new web platform to help protect migrant workers from abusive employment practices.

    The web platform provides migrant workers with peer-to-peer reviews about recruitment agencies in their country of origin and destination.

    The Recruitment Advisor, developed by the ITUC with support from the ILO Fair Recruitment initiative, listed thousands of agencies in Nepal, Philippines, Indonesia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, and other countries.

    The platform allows workers to comment on their experiences, rate the recruitment agencies and learn about their rights.

    Ultimately, Recruitment Advisor will promote recruiters, who follow a fair recruitment process based on ILO General Principles and Operational Guidelines for fair recruitment and will provide useful feedback to governments regarding the practices of licensed recruitment agencies, which could be used to complement more traditional monitoring systems.

    ITUC General Secretary, Sharan Burrow, who spoke on the initiative, said:“Unscrupulous recruitment agencies take advantage of the lack of law enforcement by governments or because workers are simply not aware of their rights.

    “It is time to put power back into workers’ hands to rate the recruitment agencies and show whether their promises of jobs and wages are delivered.”

    The ITUC scribe insisted that an organised workforce cannot be enslaved, but when there is a governance failure and no law enforcement, then slavery can flourish.

    She added: “Together we will stop unscrupulous recruitment practices, we will eliminate slavery in the supply chains and we will end modern day slavery.”

  • Union seeks more funding for researchers

    The Academic Staff Union of Research Institutions (ASURI), has called for more funding of research institutes.

    Its Secretary-General, Dr. Theophilus Ndubuaku, who made the call in a statement in Abuja, said the union would hold a two-day conference in Abuja, to draw the government’s attention to poor funding of research institutes.

    The conference, he said, would be attended by over 1,000 researchers, and an there will be an exhibition of breakthrough research works.

    “The researchers, drawn from research institutes, agencies and allied colleges in Nigeria, will meet with the aim of mobilising the nation in support of adequate research funding,” he said.

    Over 100 mandate research institutions, agencies and allied colleges are billed to participate in the event with the theme: “Research Our Hope.”

    The Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr. Boss Mustapha, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Alhaji Muhammad Musa Bello and the Senate Minority Whip, Philip Aduda,  are expected to attend the conference.

     

  • Labour must defend Nigerians, says AUPCTRE

    Amalgamated Union of Public Corporations, Civil Service Technical and Recreational Services Employees (AUPCTRE) President Comrade Anthony Benjamin has challenged organised labour to demand for good governance from elected leaders and defend Nigerians.

    “We owe it a patriotic duty to rise to demand for good governance from our elected leaders. This is to say that the character of the Nigeria ruling class is exploitative and parasitic; therefore, we, as working class, must wake up to defend Nigerians,” he said while speaking to reporters, after the successful state delegates’ conference of the union in Abuja.

    Benjamin kicked against privatisation of public utilities, especially water and other sectors.

    He said states, such as Lagos were busy bringing in companies that have ruined water systems in some countries of the world.

    He said: “Today the government has extended the Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) to education and health sectors. The contradiction with our leaders is that while United Kingdom and United States that privatised their water more than 30 years ago are taking back water from private hands, Nigerian leaders are shamelessly pursuing the policy.

    “As leaders and workers, we must realise that neo-liberalism and globalisation have done a great havoc to workers’ solidarity and comradeship. The situation now is that, workers world over and communities, have turned against one another. The scenario today is such that while workers or group of workers are complaining of under payment or non-payment of wages, the unemployed youths are being turned into common thugs and engage in anti-social activities. We owe it a patriotic duty to rise to demand for good governance from our elected leaders.”

    “Some of us came into this struggle today not because of what we stand to gain but because we have passion for it,” Benjamin added.

  • ILO predicts high unemployment, decent work deficit in 2018

    The International Labour Organisation’s (ILO’s) flagship report: the World Employment and Social Outlook:Trends 2018, has shown that while the global unemployment rate is stabilising, unemployment and decent work deficits will stay at persistently high levels in many parts of the world.

    The report indicated that as the global economy recovers, but with a growing labour force, global unemployment in 2018 is projected to remain at similar level to last year’s.

    According to the new report by the ILO, the global unemployment rate has been stabilising after a rise in 2016. It is expected to have reached 5.6 per cent in 2017, with the total number of unemployed exceeding 192 million persons.

    “Even though global unemployment has stabilised, decent work deficits remain widespread: the global economy is still not creating enough jobs. Additional efforts need to be put in place to improve the quality of work for jobholders and to ensure that the gains of growth are shared equitably,” ILO Director-General Guy Ryder said.

    Vulnerable employment, he said, is on the rise and the pace of working poverty reduction is slowing.

    The report highlighted the fact that the significant progress achieved in the past in reducing vulnerable employment has essentially stalled since 2012.

    According to ILO, almost 1.4 billion workers are estimated to be in vulnerable employment in 2017, and that an additional 35 million are expected to join them by 2019. In developing countries, vulnerable employment affects three out of four workers.

    On a more positive note, the report noted that working poverty continues to fall in emerging countries, where the number of people in extreme working poverty is expected to reach 176 million in 2018.

    The report also looked at the influence of population ageing. It showed that the growth of the global workforce will not be sufficient to compensate for the rapidly expanding pool of retirees. The average age of working people is projected to rise from just under 40 in 2017 to over 41 in 2030.

  • Pensioners to smile soon, says PenCom Ag DG

    National Pension Commission (PenCom) Acting Director-General, Mrs Aisha Dahir-Umar has said pensioners will soon smile as the Federal Government is set to pay the next batch of retirees.

    Speaking with The Nation, Dahir-Umar said PenCom had been working on modalities for payment to enable it to release substantial funds for the retirees, adding that retirees that perfected their documentation and verification would be captured for the payments in the next batch.

    The PenCom chief commended President Muhammudu Buhari for attending to retirees’well-being by settling accrued pension rights for that period.

    “Despite conflicting demands for available cash, President Buhari had always expressed concern about the plight of workers and pensioners.

    “It has brought relief to thousands of our elders who have served and deserve to be paid their entitlements promptly and fully,” she said.

    She further said some pensioners in the last batch that did not receive their pension must have been caused by errors in documentation and verification process.

    “Such also may be caused by late documentation.’’

    She denied allegations that the commission and Pension Fund Administrators (PFAs) delayed payments and misappropriated pensions funds.

    She said the commission and the PFAs were being watched by the Federal Government and guarded by core principles that could not be truncated.

    She said the PFAs paid the pensioners that registered under them without delay, once the Federal Government released the fund through PenCom.

    Dahir-Umar said the micro-pension scheme was expected to help raise the number of pension contributors to 20 million by next year and 30 million by 2024. It was also expected to generate about N3 trillion to the pension assets, while mobilising about 12 million contributors within five years.

    “Micro pensions is a scheme tar-geted at self-employed people, especially those with irregular income, usually in the informal sector and are largely financially uninformed with limited or no access to financial services, especially pension plan.

    “This segment, which is estimated to be 70 percent of the country’s population, largely exists in Nigeria as artisans and self-employed persons,” she said.

  • Workers reject plan to reinstate SEC boss

    Organised labour under the aegis of Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN) has faulted the Federal Government’s alleged plan to reinstate the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Director-General (DG), Mr. Mounir Gwarzo.

    ASCSN said reinstating Gwarzo, who is on suspension for corruption charges, would further dent the anti-graft war of the present administration.

    In a statement in Abuja, the ASCSN State Secretary, the Federal Capital Territory, Comrade Isaac Ojemhenke, said feelers from the Presidency indicate that President Muhammadu Buhari was under intense pressure by some members of his inner cabinet to recall the SEC DG.

    He alleged that the president’s inner cabinet assured him that even if there was an outcry, it would soon fizzle out just like the case of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) Executive Secretary, Prof. Usman Yusuf, who was reinstated and heavens did not fall.

    “But what the cabal does not seem to understand is that the impression being created in the minds of millions of Nigerians with the policy of recalling chief executives and other top government officials enmeshed in financial malpractices is that the war against corruption is a ruse.

    “It is necessary to recall that Mr Gwarzo was suspended after a properly-constituted Administrative Panel set up by the Finance Minister, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, found him culpable of financial improprieties,” the union emphasised.

    According to the ASCSN, apart from the fact that the SEC DG approved and paid himself a humongous N105 million as severance benefit while still serving as SEC DG, Gwarzo was also involved in other financial scams, such as compelling the Commission to  award contracts to companies he served as director.

    ASCSN added that this action was a gross violation of Public Service Rules, Financial Regulations and other extant government guidelines dealing with conducts of public officers.

    “By planning to reinstate the SEC DG, the government is creating the impression that Mr Gwarzo is indispensable, yet, the Commission had continued to function during his absence.

    “There are many qualified Nigerians that are capable of performing excellently in such exalted positions so, why should the government continue to reinstate individuals with character deficit into strategic offices,” the Union said.