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Tag: NLC

  • NLC, Falana criticise U.S, others over Ebola

    NLC, Falana criticise U.S, others over Ebola

    The Nigeria Labour Congress and rights activist, Femi Falana (SAN), on Wednesday criticised the United States, China and other prosperous nations for not doing enough to support countries being ravaged by the Ebola Virus Disease.

    The NLC  Vice President, Isa Aremu and Falana noted that unlike Cuba, which has deployed men and materials in support of countries troubled by the disease, the U.S, China and other rich nations were still hesitant in fully supporting the war against Ebola in poor West African countries mostly affected by the disease.

    Aremu and Falana spoke in Abuja during a visit to the Cuban Embassy.

    They said their visit was to commend Cuba for assisting Africa in the fight against Ebola, by sending medical professionals to the affected countries.

    The Cuban Ambassador to Nigeria, Hugo Nilanes, who received the visitors, said 83 Cuban medical professionals departed for Liberia and Guinea on October 21 to join 165 others, who left Cuba on October 1, for Sierra Leone to help in the ongoing efforts to rid the West African nations of Ebola.

    Falana noted that of all the nations of the world, particularly the prosperous ones, it is only Cuba that has shown leadership by sending medical team to assist the affected countries fight the disease.

    “While the United States send troops to kill people around the world, Cuba sends doctors to the rest of the world to save lives,” the activist said.

    Aremu, who spoke for NLC, described Cuba as “the moral capital of the world and a true friend of Africa.”

    “We are proud of the Cuban support. We have not seen such practical demonstration of support from countries, such as China, which make a lot of profit from Africa. I don’t know of any Cuban construction company operating in Nigeria.

    “I think Cuba has shown that it is a true friend of Africa,” the NLC vice president stated.

     

  • NLC laments lack of worthy successors

    Deputy President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Joe Ajearo has lamented the dearth of worthy successors to the trade union movement in the country, saying values have been tremendously destroyed. Ajaero, who spoke to reporters  in Abuja, blamed the situation on poverty, which he said was deliberately created  by Nigeria’s ruling elite for the deterioration of values. He noted that the development has adversely affected Nigerian student unions.

    He said that the present crop of students that make up the leadership of the National Association of Nigeria Students (NANS) cannot fit into the union because of their approach to the struggle, unlike today’s unionists, who were also student activists during their time.

    “Today, you wonder the recruitment process. If you are to replicate it, will you say you want to recruit the kind of NANS you see today compared to the former ones that engaged General Ibrahim Babangida? When everyone left, it was only NANS that engaged him and the military.

    “Even the place you want to recruit from, what is left of it? So whatever is happening in the society has the tendency to reflect in other parts of the economy including labour, academics and others. The value system of graduates in Nigeria has been bastardised. You cannot do anyhow in those days. These days even when they know you are corrupt, they will celebrate and give you traditional title,” he said.

  • Why we can’t tackle corruption, by NLC chief Ajearo

    Why we can’t tackle corruption, by NLC chief Ajearo

    •Labour chief faults recruitment process

    Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) Deputy President Joe Ajearo has explained why the union has not been able to tackle corruption in the country.

    He said the NLC lacked the right “mechanism” to fight the menace.

    Ajaero noted that although it was necessary for the umbrella labour union to engage in such action, but it had not partnered appropriate agencies, especially the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), on the matter.

    The labour chieftain spoke yesterday in Abuja.

    He stressed the need for the union to adopt a credible and efficient recruitment of members.

    Ajaero said: “We have not really institutionalised a mechanism to insist on probing a person found to have corruptly enriched himself. Labour can think in that line. For us to do that, we don’t have the police or the EFCC. It may end at the level of agitation.

    “You know also that this has a legal limitation because the law says nobody is guilty until proven innocent. That is a limitation. We can quantify, morally, that this person is guilty. But if there is no clear case of corruption, we are limited.”

    The union leader acknowledged that he was recruited from students’ unionism to union politics.

    He hailed other former students’ union leaders, like Comrade Salisu Mohammed, John Oda, among others, were recruited into the NLC.

    Ajaero alleged some of today’s unionists lacked the requisite ideology, unlike those in the early years of unionism.

    According to him, present members of the National Association of Nigeria Students (NANS) cannot be absorbed into the union.

    He said: “Today, you wonder the recruitment process. But if you are to replicate it, will you say you want to recruit the kinds of NANS you see today, compared to the former ones, who engaged General Ibrahim Babangida? When everyone left, it was only NANS that engaged him and the military.

    “Even the place you want to recruit from, what is left of it? So, whatever is happening in the society has the tendency to reflect on other parts of it – labour, academics and others.

    “The value system of graduate in Nigeria has been bastardised. You cannot do anyhow in those days. In these days, even when they know you are corrupt, they will celebrate and give you a traditional title.”

    Ajearo regretted the dwindling educational and value system in the country.

    The union leader noted that workers, except former NLC President and Edo State Governor Adams Oshiomole, refused to show interest in political positions.

    He cited situations where political office aspirants took oaths from god fathers before they could be sponsored for elections.

    Ajaero said: “If you have an agreement with your godfather, like ‘I will give you N100 million and you will pay back N150 million’, when you win an election and enter office, it is another level of looting for you to meet up.”

    The NLC chief noted that ordinary workers cannot fund their quest for political positions because election processes had been commercialised.

    “…The people will need good governance. When those godfathers mortgage you, at the end of the day, you start bringing returns, if you are elected a governor (for instance),” he added.

    Ajearo promised to make a difference if elected the NLC at the next delegates’ conference.

    On why the NLC and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) appeared inactive, compared to the tenure of former labour presidents, he said the commitment to labour administrations varies.

    According to him, someone who was actively involved in labour from his early age cannot be compared with others who engaged in labour activities on a part-time basis.

    “There is another problem, which is societal. Before now, you could not serve as a unionist without being ideological. You must have it. Those ideologies guided your principle. You could not seek positions to cheapen yourself but to defend the workers,” Ajearo said.

     

  • Re-inventing human resources

    We are undoubtedly in the age of global capital with its arrogant self-claim (or is it self-delusion?) as the key and only key driver of growth. The triumph of capitalism (as it were!) has elevated money and finance as indispensable factors of growth. Yet beyond ideological dogma, serious statesmen and development scholars know that it is not yet an end of history for labour and human resource as critical factor of development. The motto of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) sums it up; Labour Creates Wealth.

    Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashidi Al Maktoum, the Vice President of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and constitutional monarch of Dubai suffers no radicalism. He remains a hard-nosed conservative modernizer. In his latest book, MY VISION, Challenges in the Race for Excellence, he remarks (and I agree with him) that; ”Human beings are the most precious assets of all nations and the most important factors in the progress of countries. We consider the development of human resources as a gauge for the development of our country.”

    I searched in vain for some quotable quotes about human resources from Nigeria’s leaders currently jostling for political positions. In 2009 there was a dramatic 35% crash in stock prices. There was a mass frenzy to save the stock market. Trillions of naira was expended by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to rescue and recapitalize six banks in 2010! Open unemployment is as high as 50 per cent. Where are the trillions of naira to reinvent the labour market through re-industrialization, revival of industries and mass employment of the army of unemployed?

    In 2014, almost 69 per cent of all candidates who sat for West Africa Examination failed to have five credits including English and Mathematics! Indeed only 31.2 percent (i.e. 528,039 out of 1,692,435 candidates) had credit pass in five subjects including English and Mathematics in the 2014 as against a 36.57 percent in 2013, and 38.81 percent in 2012. This free fall in the value of present and future human resources has not shocked the nation beyond the ordinary lamentation and excuses. The concluded National Conference of which I was a delegate had 20 sub-committees. I bear witness that the relatively insignificant marginal report on Resource Control of the sub-Committee on Devolution of Powers generated more enthusiasm and controversies than the reports on human resources like Labour, Youth dealing with mass unemployment and mass poverty!

    Certainly there is more to resources than oil and gas and how to share it or control it through some self-serving group sharing formulae?  According to the Minister of Health Dr. Onyebuchi Chukwu, more than 5000 Nigerian-trained medical doctors are currently practising in the United States of America! Yet Nigeria has only 600 paediatricians to care for its over 40 million children compared with the United Kingdom’s over 5,000 for 20 million children. Why must we export doctors when we lack them at home? Why are we eager to “control” oil revenue and remain indifferent to the New York Times’ report according to which, “America Is Stealing the World’s Doctors” including many Nigerian doctors?

    The formation of Nigeria’s human capital is of great importance in the coming years if Nigeria wants to be part of the leading economies in 2020. A notable strength of Nigeria is its population. With 170 million people, we are the seventh most populous on earth. 2006 Census figures show that the least populated State is Bayelsa with 1.7 million, but more in terms of human resources than Guinea-Bissau with population of 1.7 million; also bigger than Gabon, 1.4 million; and Trinidad and Tobago, 1.3 million. Both Kano (9.4 million) and Lagos (9.5 million) are as big as United Arab Emirates of 9.4 million, which is the leisure destination of Nigerian bourgeoisie and labour aristocrats like me. Nigeria’s human resources are however in quantity not in quality needed for national development.

    According to Human Development Index, Nigeria is ranked 156 among 187 countries meaning that Nigeria is considered to have low level of human development. The National Mass Education Commission, NMEC, just revealed that as many as 64 million Nigerian adults are illiterates! This is a tragedy turned shame! Countries with less endowment like Zimbabwe and Cuba had archived literacy rates of 90.70 and 99. 9 percent respectively. How come the 13th oil producing nation has slid back into mass ignorance and underdevelopment?  Local government edicts and state laws must make primary education compulsory and criminalize and penalize parents that do not allow their wards to go schools in the 21st century. To appreciate human resource, we must motivate the labour which constitutes the greatest resource. We must ensure workers are paid well and on time. It should be noted that delay of salary is the same as wage theft. We must also institute a system of reward and discipline to motivate labour for development. I commend President Goodluck Jonathan for the recent national honour and recognition of the designer of Nigerian flag, Pa Taiwo Akinkunmi after years of neglect and his employment as a Special Assistant, with a salary for life! Indeed the President is further encouraged to pay his arrears since 1960 when he designed Nigerian flag. We must move from jobless to job-led growth. We must re-invent the real sector of the economy, revive labour intensive industries and get the army of unemployed working. We must improve on productivity. In 1958, late Ahmadu Bello, the premier of the then Northern Region declared that; “My motto for the new born North is “Work and worship”. We should not consume what we do not produce. We must stop exporting what we should add value to.  There are little critical success factors within our immediate reach. The most precious input factor in productivity is time and time management. We parade highest number of public holidays on earth. Some of these holidays legitimize idleness rather than promoting decent work with respect to rest. How on earth do you declare a work-free day to “mark” Democracy Day, a day arbitrarily chosen by one man in office that could even fall on a Monday?

    Why would children not be in schools on a Monday in the name of democracy? Religious holidays fall on a Saturday; Sunday is already a public holiday anyway. Why then declare Monday and Tuesday as holidays? This mutual preference to stay off duty by both “Christians” and “Muslims” definitely leads to underdevelopment. Nigeria works eight hours, five days a week. But on average, other 19 countries in our preferred club of 20 most developed countries, (come the magic 2020!) work longer hours, six days a week. Out of 365 days in a year, Nigeria is at rest for some 120 days. Out of the official eight hours, we resume unofficially at 10 am, set to do some unofficial school (children) runs by noon, only to unofficially close shops at 3 pm ostensibly to beat the traffic. When we are working, we are poor anyway. Indeed we are all working poor. Is it when we are idle that we will get out of poverty? It’s all about managing human resources for development.

     

    • Aremu mni is Secretary-General, Alumni Association of the National Institute, AANI

  • Why we can’t tackle corruption – NLC

    The Deputy President of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Joe Ajearo, has explained why the union has been unable to tackle corruption in the country.

    He said the NLC currently lacks the right “mechanism’’ to fight the menace.

    Ajaero said though it was necessary for the labour to engage in such action, the NLC was yet to partner with law enforcement agencies especially the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on the situation.

    The labour chieftain, who spoke to journalists in Abuja, Tuesday, also emphasised need for the union to adopt a credible and efficient method of recruiting comrades into the union.

    “We have not really institutionalized a mechanism to insist on probing a person found to have corruptly enriched himself. Labour can think in that line. And for us to do that, we don’t have the police or the EFCC. It may end at the level of agitation. You know also that this has legal limitation because the law says nobody is guilty until proven otherwise. That is a limitation. We can quantify morally that this person is guilty, but if there is no clear case of corruption, we are limited,” he said.

    Ajearo, who acknowledged he was recruited from student unionism to union politics, expressed happiness at how ex-student union leaders such as Comrade Salisu Mohammed and John Oda among others were recruited into the NLC.

     

  • We won’t recognise Akure LP’s convention, says NLC

    We won’t recognise Akure LP’s convention, says NLC

    Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has said it will not accept any leadership emerging from Saturday’s National Convention of the Labour Party (LP).

    The convention elected the LP’s former National Chairman, Dan Nwanyanwu, as the Chairman of the party’s Board of Trustees.

    NLC General Secretary Dr. Peter Ozo-Eson told The Nation in a telephone interview that the workers’  body would not accept any leadership that emerged from the Akure convention, which he described as flawed.

    The NLC, he added, would come out with a definite position within the week after due consultation with the Trade Union Congress (TUC) and other stakeholders on the way forward.

    He noted that the LP was founded by the unions, adding that they were not parties to whatever came out of the convention, which took place in Akure.

    But the NLC and the TUC had, at a news conference two days to the convention, said that they would not accept attempt at making the LP an appendage of another political party.

    The unions said they were against a governor who belongs to another party sponsoring and hosting the national convention of LP.

    They called for the postponement of the convention for stakeholders to meet and decide on another venue and date for the convention, asking all members of the party to ignore the call to go to Akure to attend the convention.

  • ‘NLC, TUC to reclaim Labour Party’

    ‘NLC, TUC to reclaim Labour Party’

    Organised labour, under the auspices of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) has said it will reclaim the Labour Party (LP) and build a strong, virile party to work for the interest of the people.

    Addressing a news conference in Abuja yesterday, NLC President Abdulwahed Omar and his TUC counterpart, Boboye Kaigama, said they would not watch the independence of the party taken over by another party.

    The labour leaders, who spoke against the backdrop of the defection of Ondo State Governor Olusegun Mimiko to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP),  said they would not accept the party as an appendage of another party.

    Urging members and other stakeholders not to attend the national convention holding in Akure this weekend, until a new date and venue is fixed, they said although there is nothing wrong in parties forming alliances, they would not accept a situation where a governor, who has defected to another party, would sponsor and host LP.

    The labour leaders noted that such a convention would not be independent and called for a new date and venue.

    Omar, who spoke on behalf of the labour leaders, said: “We have been watching with interest the activities of the Labour Party recently. We were present at the last National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting of the party where a date and venue for the convention were fixed.

    “The date was fixed for October 4 and was again shifted. More important was the venue, which was slated to be Akure. However, we are concerned about the fixing, the sponsorship, the supervision and the hosting of the convention.

    “You will recall that recently, the only governor elected on the platform of the Labour Party, Governor Olusegun Mimiko, declared for the Peoples Democratic Party with members of his executive and members of the House of Assembly.

    “It is a major concern to us that a governor, who has already defected to another party, is the one sponsoring, hosting and supervising a convention of an independent party, such as the Labour Party.

    “It is that concern, which made us to call this meeting of stakeholders of the Labour Party with a view to making sure that we call for the postponement of the Akure convention with a view to fixing a new date and a new venue that will be more independent to allow for the party to hold its convention  independent of external forces.|

    “I enjoin labour conscious people, who are either set to attend the convention or are already there to disregard this convention and return home. The labour movement is committed to building a strong and prosperous Labour Party, which will serve the interest of workers and other Nigerians.”

  • NLC accuses Mbu of promoting anarchy

    NLC accuses Mbu of promoting anarchy

    The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) accused yesterday Assistant Inspector-General of Police Joseph Mbu of promoting anarchy.

    It described him as an embarrassment to the  Force.

    In a statement titled: “Watch this lion” by the General-Secretary, Dr. Peter Ozo-Eson, NLC decried the arrest, detention and torture of Amaechi Anaekwe, a reporter with the Africa Independent Television, for referring to him as controversial.

    It said freedom of speech is guaranteed in the constitution, stressing that the arrest and detention of Anaekwe was an attempt to muzzle the press and free speech in a democracy.

  • NLC, TUC move to restore order to Labour Party

    NLC, TUC move to restore order to Labour Party

    •Warn members against Akure convention

    The two umbrella labour bodies, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) have asked members of the Labour Party (LP) to ignore the party’s convention scheduled for Akure, the Ondo State capital, this weekend.T

    The unions, who are major stakeholders in the LP, said in a statement by Abdulwaheed Omar and  Bobboi Bala Kaigama, presidents of the NLC and TUC that a broad-based consultation would be carried out to decide on the modalities for convening a national convention for the party.

    Both unions at a meeting of the National Executive Committee of the party, held at its national secretariat in Abuja, said it would henceforth take interest in the affairs of the party.

    The statement said in view of the fact that they were committed to the development and sustainability of a true working people’s party, they had directed the National Labour Political Commission to organise a broad, all-inclusive stakeholders’ meeting tomorrow to discuss the way forward for the party.

    The statement reads: “There had been speculation that Governor Olusegun Mimiko, the only governor on the platform of the Labour Party (LP) would defect to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    “The die has now been cast and Governor Mimiko, who was elected Ondo State governor for a second term on LP’s platform, has defected to the PDP. This has brought changes and challenges to the LP.

    “One implication of this action of the governor is that he is no longer a member of the LP. Consequently, the proposed convention of the party in Akure, which venue was hitherto chosen in deference to the office of the then only Labour Party governor is no longer tenable.

    “Even before Dr. Mimiko’s defection, NLC and TUC, through their political commission, had cautioned on the dangers of proceeding with the proposed convention, given a number of disturbing developments, including court challenges and factionalisation in the party.

    “As major stakeholders, the two labour unions are committed to the development and sustainability of a true working people’s party. To this end, the NLC and the TUC are convinced on the imperative of holding broad-based consultations to decide on the modalities for having a successful convention.

    “We have mandated the National Labour Political Commission to organise a broad, all-inclusive stakeholders’ meeting on October 9 to discuss the way forward for the party. We, therefore, urge LP members to refrain from participating in the convention called for October 11 in Akure.”

  • NLC opposes NYSC’s online registration

    NLC opposes NYSC’s online registration

    The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has asked the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) to withdraw the online registration policy, which tends to charge prospective corps members about N4,000.

      It said the policy was unacceptable.

     A statement titled: “We are opposed to this policy”, by the General-Secretary, Dr. Peter Ozo-Eson, said while NLC hailed NYSC for the initiative to reduce the cost and risk associated with travelling, it was morally wrong to turn it into a money-making venture.