The Trade Union Congress (TUC), the umbrella organisation for senior civil servants, has decided not to join the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC)’s two-day warning strike, as the union decided at its National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting on Sunday to continue dialogue with the government to ease the pain of the removal of petrol subsidies.
Recall that the NLC is apparently planning a two-day warning strike – tomorrow and Wednesday – to protest the federal government’s slowness in taking steps to alleviate the hardship caused by the elimination of fuel subsidies.
According to the NLC, the decision was made due to the “failure of the Federal Government to dialogue and engage stakeholders within organised labour on efforts to cushion the effects of the removal of the petrol subsidy on workers.”
According to a TUC source, the union argued that the planned strike is “premature,” and that joining the NLC in it will further jeopardise the interests of the general public.
READ ALSO: Subsidy Removal: NLC Presses Ahead With Mobilisation For A Two-Day Warning Strike
The TUC top member chastised the NLC leadership for stalling negotiations between Organised Labour and a team from the Federal Government headed by Femi Gbajabiamila, the President’s Chief of Staff.
According to the source, “The TUC feels there is no need to embark on a strike because we are still discussing with the Federal Government on the issue of palliatives for workers.”
“The TUC is not joining the NLC on that planned warning strike. The reason is because we are reaching out to the Federal Government. The government has already released palliatives to the states, and we are also expecting the government to release the one for federal workers.
“When we met with the Senate, the statement by the NLC that they don’t have confidence in the Chief of Staff to the President-led committee led to the suspension of that committee because the man (Femi Gbajabiamila) felt if the NLC doesn’t have confidence in him why should he be leading the committee when the outcome will not be palatable? That stalled the work of the committee.
“Now, there is a Minister of Labour and Employment (Simon Lalong), who is supposed to be the leader of the government team. There is an ongoing effort to interact with us to get results.
”We feel that it is not the right time to go on strike. When you go on strike, we will be putting the masses at the receiving end because the government has a way of navigating out of such matters.
”Again, the issue of strike should not be one-sided. It should be a joint effort by the two labour centres to agree before issuing a strike notice. One centre cannot claim superiority over the other centre. It is not done anywhere.
“You cannot announce a strike and then decide to bring us in. It is supposed to be a decision taken by the two centres.
”The NLC is free to go on strike on its own. We are different unions.”
