Despite President Bola Tinubu’s promised intervention through some palliatives to cushion the effects of subsidy removal, the organised labour says it is proceeding on its nationwide strike from Wednesday.
This is also in spite of the meeting with the Presidential Steering Committee on Palliatives on Monday as the Labour leaders day they are nit convinced of commitments on the osrt if the committee . Joe Ajaero, the President of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) told journalist on Monday evening after the meeting of the steering committee, that workers would proceed on a peaceful protest from Wednesday. However, the meeting was adjourned till Tuesday noon to continue discussions on ways to ameliorate the harsh effects of the removal of fuel subsidy. The adjournment was to allow all parties the time to listen to the President Bola Tinubu’s broadcast. Speaking on the planned protest, Ajaero dismissed fears that the protest could be hijacked by hoodlums, saying that such had never happened in the history of workers’ protest. He, however, said it was the responsibility of security agencies to protect protesting workers Ajaero said: “by the time you have a single market and you are not having anything that has a comparative advantage, your energy is import driven, then how are you going to control it? “How are you going to control somebody that exchanged dollar at about 900 (naira)? Are you going to tell him to sell below the price? “How are you going to tell even NEPA today, with the cost of production not to increase tariff? “Even corn in the villages that was sold at N18,000 by February, now it’s about 56,000. How are you going to control it?” Femi Gbajabiamila, the Chief of Staff to the President, said the issues were trashed at the close- door meeting. He said that the government was dealing with the oil cabals that had brought the economy to its knees. “We have been locked behind for a couple of hours, we had a good meeting, issues were thrashed out on the situation in Nigeria today in terms of issues centered around on government intervention on the situation in the country. “We agreed to adjourn till tomorrow as you know Mr President is making a national broadcast today. “Based on what we anticipate that Mr. President will be telling Nigerians, we decided to adjourn meeting till 12pm tomorrow before labour can decide whether or not they want to continue with the protest on Wednesday.
But an official of Labour told metrobusinessnews.com (“MBN) that the president’s address dud not address immediate remedies to the growing hardship, stressing that the broadcast was still aspirational.
According to him, waiting for the next two to three months before the manifestations of the promised succour could mean ‘death’ to may people.
But, he was quick to add that, may be there are other ‘hidden or reserved’ Immediate palliatives that the president is still keeping to his chest that would only be disclosed later today, or else, the strike may likely hold as planned.