Barely four hours to the commencement of the conciliatory meeting with Federal Government, Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) issued a formal notice for nationwide protest and mass mobilisation on Tuesday, 8th January, 2019.
The negotiation scheduled to hold today, Monday by 5.30pm, was to fine tune fiscal issues on the implementation of the new minimum wage.
While Federal Government insisted on set up of high level Technical Committee that will advice federal and state governments on how to sustain the implementation of the N30,000 new minimum wage, the leadership of NLC and Trade Union Congress (TUC) opposed the move, since the Tripartite Committee had completed its assignment.
The Tuesday protest which will hold simultaneously in the 36 states of the Federation and Abuja, was part of efforts aimed at pressing for the transmission of the N30,000 national minimum wage bill to the National Assembly.
According to Peter Ozo-Eson, NLC General Secretary, all the NLC affiliates and civil society allies have been fully mobilized for the nationwide protest.
“It has come to our attention that some section of the news media has largely misrepresented our action plan in reaction to the delay in transmitting the recommendations of the Tripartite Committee on a new National Minimum Wage to the National Assembly by President Muhammadu Buhari.
“It should be recalled that the National Executive Council of NLC met on 17th of December last year and directed that we hold nationwide mobilisation of workers and our allies if by 31st December 2018 the bill on the National Minimum Wage has yet to be sent to the National Assembly to be passed as an Act of Parliament.
“We immediately announced then that on Tuesday, 8th January 2019, there will be a nationwide mass mobilisation and protests simultaneously across all states in Nigeria. This does not translate to a strike.
“It is on record that each time we had cause to embark on a national strike, we say so publicly without any equivocation. We still don’t understand where the story about a strike commencing tomorrow came from.
“Already, all our State Councils, affiliate unions and allies in other pro-people mass organisations now popularly referred to as Civil Society Organisations have been fully informed and mobilised to ensure the success of tomorrow’s mass protests in all the states and the Federal Capital Territory.
“When a date is decided for the commencement of a strike subsequently, we will inform the public appropriately,” Ozo-Eson said in the statement.
KEHINDE AKINTOLA, Abuja
