The Organised Labour has concluded arrangements to embark on a nation-wide strike over the decision by the National Assembly to remove the issue of the National Minimum Wage from the Exclusive Legislative List.
The Union described the move as a deliberate attempt to allow some state governors to pay slave wages to the poor workers and questioned the rationale behind the move when all political office holders and retinue of aides are collecting humongous salary across the federation.
Consequently, Labour has declared a warning national protest over the issue and other issues of concern to the workers which will take place on Wednesday,10th March,2021. In Abuja and the 36
states of the federation.
The NLC in an emergency National Executive Council ( NEC) held on Tuesday ,at Labour House,Abuja considered the attempt to remove the minimum wage from the Exclusive Lagislative List and the ploy to establish State Judicial Councils and the current hoarding and scarcity of petrol.
Addressing a press conference shortly after the NEC meeting,NLC President,Ayuba Wabba, said after careful consideration of the issues and their implications to the working class family and the Nigerian masses, NEC resolved to embark” on a national protest action commencing from March 10,2021, in the Federal Capital Territory and especially to the National Assembly.
“The protest is to make a strong statement that Nigerian workers would not lie low and watch hard- fought rights which are of global standards bastardized by opportunistic and narrow thinking politicians.
“The NEC resolved that the national protest action will be concurrently held in all the 36 states of the federation and to the different State Houses of Assembly across Nigeria.
Wabba said “NEC decided that should the need arise, it has empowered the National Administrative Council of the NLC to declare and enforce a national strike if the legislators continue on the ruinous path of moving the National Minimum Wage from the Exclusive Lagislative List to the Concurrent Legislative List
” The NEC condemned and rejected in its entirety the ploy to decentralize Nigeria’s judiciary through the establishment of State Judicial Councils describing the move as unpatriotic,self serving and an attempt to throw Nigeria into judicial and social chaos.
” On the current hoarding of petrol and the attendant scarcity, the NEC called on relevant regulatory agencies of government to rise up to the protection of interests of the majority of Nigeriars from the exploitative hands of market forces who are bent on making maximal profits from the sufferings of fellow citizens
“The NLC warned that should the current artificial scarcity persist that the various leadership structures of the NLC should picket stations found to be inflicting pains on Nigerians.
“The NEC resolved that all the resolutions and decisions adopted at the emergency meeting should be pursued in collaboration with the Trade Union Congress (TUC) in the overall interest of all Nigerian workers.
It regretted that the bill on the National Minimum Wage which was sponsored by Garba Datti of Sabon Gari Federal Constituency, Kaduna State,had passed through first and second reading in the House of Representatives.
While” the NEC considered that the bill is a classic case of the hand of Esau and the voice of Jacob as it has all the imprimatur of anti- workers forces in the poltical establishment,.it considereed Hon.Garba Datti as only a hireling in the plot by his sponsors to disorient, injured, and exterminate Nigeria’s working class.
“The NEC warned that any attempt to move the National Minimum Wage from the Exclusive Lagislative List to Concurrent Legislative List will make Nigeria a laughing stock in the comity of nations given the fact that the Minimum Wage is an offshoot of a global convention ratified by Nigeria and that Nigeria as a Sovereign state gave effect to the National Minimum Wage by putting it in the Exclusive Lagislative List.
” In the light of the foregoing, NEC called on President Muhammadu Buhari not to allow fifth columnists masquerading as polticians to detail his governmentt by railroading the legislature into removing the national minimum wage from the exclusive to the concurrent list- a move that the global workers solidarity regards as anathema.,”
