The
Nigeria Labour Congress [NLC] has given the federal government two
weeks from Friday November 18, 2011 to fulfil all agreements reached
with workers of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria [PHCN] or risk an
indefinite strike action by the labour unions.
Speaking on the
situation in the Power Holding Company to journalists in Abuja, the
General Secretary of the union, Mr Owei Lekamfa accused government of
hiding under the guise of security threats to deploy armed soldiers who
are used to guide foreign investors and the Bureau for Public
Procurement on facility assessment tour without involving the management
of the PHCN.
Lekamfa assured that PHCN workers will avoid
shutting down power supply in the interest of the nation and her
citizens who depend on power generation but government must fulfil its
side of the bargain to ensure affordable, accessible and available power
supply.
Previously, the NLC President Comrade Abdulwaheed Omar
raised alarm over the Federal Government’s decision to deploy soldiers
to PHCN offices and asked that they be withdrawn.
Speaking at an
event in Kaduna, Omar expressed outrage at FG’s deployment of soldiers
to occupy the corporate Headquarters of the Power Holding Company of
Nigeria (PHCN) the Katampe, Wuse Zone 4 and Apo Transmission Stations in
Abuja, the Olorunsogo centre, Ondo State, Ayede, the Egbin Power
Station, the National Control Centre, Oshogbo and the Oshogbo Work
Centre.
“The militarization of the electricity centres is an
impotent and vain attempt by Government to force the deregulation of the
PHCN. As you might know, there are on-going negotiations between the
Federal Government and Electricity Workers on Power reform in the
country. The next round of negotiations is scheduled to hold on November
22, 2011.
“To send armed soldiers to occupy electricity
installations is therefore a calculated attempt to stall the
negotiations and impose a pre-determined solution that will see the
power sector sold as scrap to serving ministers and other cronies of the
Federal Government. The industrial relations system must be made to
work rather than Government and employers resorting to brute force”, the
NLC president said.
Worried at what he termed ‘government’s
insensitivity to the needs of the people’, Omar wondered why the chose
to embark on poverty-inducing programmes and measures that can only push
the populace to the wall and provoke a reaction by a long suffering
populace.
“A you all know, the NLC and TUC signed an agreement
with the Federal Government on July 19, 2011 on the implementation of
the N18,000 Minimum Wage. It was agreed that the implementation will
commerce from August 2011 with arrears paid from March 23, 2011. But as I
speak to you four months later, the Federal Government has failed, or
refused to implement this agreement. It appears that elements within
Government with suicidal instincts want to provoke a general strike and
mass protests on this issue.
“These elements also seem to be
responsible for other provocative Government programmes such as a
proposal to hike electricity tariff by 100 percent, re-impose toll-gates
for un-motorable roads, and through a dubious constitutional amendment,
annul the National Minimum Wage so that States and private employers
can pay starvation wages. The NLC will never allow this to happen”, Omar
said.
According to him, President Goodluck Jonathan’s
deregulation policy is a deliberate attempt at devaluing the currency in
order to devalue the N18,000 National Minimum Wage and as part of its
poverty-inducing measures.
“As we have stated elsewhere,
Government’s insistence to hike fuel prices by 120 percent will further
complicate matters for a hungry citizenry that has to cope with growing
mass unemployment and a non-existent social security. This will be an
invitation to open revolt by the citizenry and the NLC will be there to
lead the people”, Omar assured.
Source
