The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has put its members nationwide on alert as it plans to take over Labour Party offices across the country.
The NLC, in a statement signed by Joe Ajaero, the President of the Union, said the action has become necessary following the refusal of the Julius Abure-led leadership to accept and implement the Supreme Court judgment.
The NLC insisted that following the Supreme Court judgment, “Abure and members of his National Working Committee are not recognised by law as constituting the leadership of the Labour Party (LP).”
The statement noted that instead, Julius Abure has been releasing press statements rejecting the straightforward pronouncement of the Supreme Court and insisting that his leadership of the Labour Party is still intact.
According to the NLC, “The current affront of Mr. Julius Abure and co-travellers against the law, especially his resistance to the pronouncement of the highest court in Nigeria, has convinced those who doubted our earlier position that Mr. Julius Abure and the few miscreants following him have sworn themselves to utter impunity, crass disdain for decency, and utmost disrespect to Nigeria’s laws.”
“While every right-thinking Nigerian expected Mr. Julius Abure and the few desperadoes around him to accept the Supreme Court judgment that affirmed what the NLC has been saying for a long time about the expiration of his purported tenure as Labour Party Chairman, they have taken steps to hold the judgment of the Supreme Court in grave contempt.”
Read Also: Court blocks Rivers Administrator from appointing LGA coordinators
“In the process of their reckless assault against the grain of constitutionality and the rule of law, they have falsely claimed that the Nigeria Labour Congress has planned to stage an attack against Labour Party offices.”
The NLC therefore stated that they are using this medium to put every Nigerian worker, Labour Party member, and patriotic citizen on alert.
“We will no longer condone the antics of inconsequential characters like Julius Abure, whose only relevance is their availability for mischief and inanity at the behest of silhouettes in the corridors of power.”
The NLC, while describing the Supreme Court as “one of the most enduring institutions and beacons of not only the rule of law but our sovereignty as a country,” warned that “Nigerian workers and people, especially genuine members of the Labour Party, will not sit back and watch unscrupulous elements desecrate Nigeria’s laws and the well-founded judgment of the Supreme Court.”
“If we fail to take action, it means that we have accepted the complete deconstruction of the institutions of state and the desecration of the shared values that bind all of us as one people under constitutional rule.”
The NLC warned that Abure and his group should “advise themselves to recuse themselves from the path of complete self-destruction they have embarked upon through their headless and heedless affront to the judgment of the Supreme Court that has swept their existence into oblivion.”
“Just as we warned him about a year ago that Nigerian workers and genuine members of the Labour Party will always collect what belongs to them, no matter how long a mischief lasts.”
“By this communication, we urge every worker in Nigeria, all genuine members of the Labour Party, and all lovers of democracy to be on standby to once again peacefully repossess all offices of Labour Party nationwide.”
“The leadership of the NLC Political Commission and other concerned Labour Party stakeholders will issue necessary directives to this effect.”
“We are also putting all the security agencies, especially the Nigeria Police Force and the State Security Service, on notice that they have a constitutional duty to enable and enforce the judgment of the Supreme Court.”
The labour union said it expects their cooperation as they pursue the rule of law, adding that “Any action to the contrary will present our dear country as a banana republic.”
The NLC also appealed to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), which they said had always pleaded alignment with the pronouncement of the court of law in the leadership issues in the Labour Party, to give full effect to the conclusive judgment of the Supreme Court by removing every insignia of Julius Abure and his National Working Committee from its portals.
“To resolve the leadership vacuum in the Labour Party, the surviving institutional members of the LP National Executive Committee (NEC) are expected to appoint an interim leadership which will conduct an inclusive Special National Convention for the party in line with the provisions of the LP Constitution and the consent judgment.”
“Any step outside these constitutional procedures will be an affront to the rule of law and would be tantamount to an unmitigable assault on constitutional rule. Such mischief will be stoutly resisted by Nigerian workers and people.”
“A word is enough for the wise!”
But Obiora Ifoh, the National Publicity Secretary of the Party, in a counter statement, described the planned action of the NLC as an “affront against INEC and security agencies.”
Ifoh also insisted that the Abure-led national executive officers remain the authentic leaders of the party.
