From 1945 when over 40,000 workers, most of whom were rendering vital services went on a national strike that lasted more than forty days, Nigeria has continued to witness different industrial actions by the organised labour. Often, the labour unions resort to strike as the most effective instrument in their hands to compel employers to recognise and bargain faithfully with either the workers or their representatives.
Correspondingly, the workers deploy this as a tool to compel the employer to comply with the terms of a collective agreement or to generally make improvements regarding the terms and conditions of their service. Without strike, workers will be powerless to deal with their employers.
But it is also true that each time Nigerian workers embark on strike the nation is brought to a standstill, with businesses incurring huge losses. Strikes often lead to a distortion in the economy arising largely from the man-days lost.
Navigating Unjustified Strike
Undoubtedly, there is justification for some of these strikes while others, to me, are needless. One of such unjustified strike actions is the latest. The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC) directed its members to withdraw their services with effect from Tuesday November 14.
Although the organised Labour claimed that the strike is aimed at compelling the government to address some of its grievances, including outstanding salary arrears, unjust declaration of 11,000 workers as ghost employees, unsettled gratuities, non-compliance with N30,000 minimum wage act, and declaration of 10,000 pensioners as ghost retirees, it is clear that the Union directed its members to down tools because the NLC President, Joe Ajaero, was assaulted in Owerri, the Imo State capital.
Labour is asking that the Area Commander it alleged led the Police to carry out the brutalisation be sacked and prosecuted. The workers’ union is also demanding that Governor Hope Uzodinma’s Special Adviser on Special Duties, Chinasa Nwaneri, be arrested and prosecuted.
Assaulting any Nigerian and most of all, leader of the workers’ union by anybody, and especially suspected security operatives, is uncalled for, callous, barbaric and amounts to naked abuse of power. There can hardly be any justification for such a condemnable act. There must be justice for the labour leader. The Nigerian government owes it a duty to ensure those behind the attack, no matter how highly placed, are made to face the full wrath of the law.
However, like most strikes by the organised labour, the ongoing industrial action embarked on essentially to protest the battering of the NLC President on November 1 has no justification and ought not to have been contemplated in the first place.
Rather than throw the entire nation into another round of strike, with all its negative impact on the economy, especially now that the nation is literally gasping for breath economically, labour should have approached the court since it knows those behind the attack on its leader.
The organised labour failed woefully to do just that, even as it couldn’t mobilise its large members in Imo State to vote out Governor Hope Uzodimma whose policies, actions and inactions have reportedly brought (and perhaps still causing) untold hardship for the workers.
Politics Gone Awry
Fundamentally, the conduct of the current leadership of the Labour Union, which has blatantly demonstrated partisanship by publicly associating with the Labour Party, has rendered it unfit to lead any protest in Imo State, for instance, on the eve of an election that its ‘party’ fielded a strong candidate.
The clear reading of labour’s protest in Imo is that it was a political rally aimed at garnering votes for its chosen candidate and not a move to press home the demands for workers’ welfare.
The NLC is now seen as an interested party, and not a neutral, nonpartisan body, in the political chess game. So, its action is always viewed from the prism of its involvement in, and sympathy for, the Labour Party.
As a matter of fact most Nigerians, including a large percentage of the workers themselves, view the NLC under the current leadership as having derailed from championing both the cause of the workers and economic development of the country.
To many, that NLC’s protest in Imo State was aimed at campaigning for the Labour Party candidate. The talk about clamour for the welfare of Imo workers was merely a smokescreen.
It appears the leadership of the workers’ union is unperturbed with public perception of organised labour as a group that has taken sides, this time around, not with the masses but with a certain political party.
Nonetheless, Labour must be told in unmistaken terms that it needs to strive to distinguish itself as a union and resist attempts to hide under the umbrella of unionism to play partisan politics, a costly mistake that will definitely weaken its impacts and influences.
Contempt As A Dent
As if playing partisan politics in the way and manner it currently does is not damaging enough, the organised labour has added another appellation to its name. It is difficult to rationalise labour’s decision to embark on strike when there is a court order barring it from taking such action.
To hear that the union is in contempt of court is not pleasing to the ear. How can one even rationalise a strike that was largely to protest a brutality that the nation’s Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, has ordered for an investigation? Even if the organised labour feigned ignorance of the IGP’s directive, should it not have halted action because of the order by the National Industrial Court?
Clearly, the current strike smacks of a deliberate attempt to make industrial action a commonplace. Labour should urgently redefine its strategy and embark on strike only when it is absolutely necessary.
Moving beyond conventional strikes to explore legal avenues in a matter like that of the attack on Ajaero, maintain political neutrality, and adhere to legal boundaries can position the country’s organised labour as a potent force for positive change without compromising the nation’s economic stability.
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