Disturbed by the declaration of a nationwide strike by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), the Federal Government has summoned the leadership of the NLC to a meeting on Wednesday next week, even as the unions have said they have exercised enough patience and would go ahead in the absence of clear direction by the government.

Sources within both labour and the government said the Minister of Labour, Chief Emeka Wogu, had been contacting labour leaders  immediately NLC issued the threat.

They had given the government a week to “withdraw the army personnel from PHCN installation and conclude negotiations with the unions on outstanding issues.” Sources said Chief Wogu was able to get the labour leaders to accept his proposal for a reconciliatory meeting.

Rising from its National Executive Council (NEC) held in Edo State, on Thursday, the NLC had threatened to commence a nation- wide strike, if by the end of one week, government and management of PHCN refused to satisfactorily conclude negotiations with the unions.

The issues in contention are the military occupation of the PHCN headquarters in Abuja and current gun-point deductions from PHCN workers’ salaries directed by the Minister of Power, Prof. Barth Nnaji.

The entreaties from the government for dialogue was reinforced by the statement issued on Friday by the minister.

The four paragraph statement issued by the Assistant Director, Ministry of Labour, Prince Samuel Olowookere late Friday evening and entitled: “Threat of nationwide power outage; labour minister to meet with organised labour unions,” read: “Towards ensuring hitch-free power sector reform and in response to reports of looming power outage due to threat of industrial action by workers in the power sector the Honourable Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Emeka Wogu CON, has in a letter dated, August 10, 2012 invited the labour movement to a meeting.

“The meeting which is scheduled for Wednesday August 15, 2012, by 2:00pm at the Honourable Minister’s Conference room, will among other things discuss current labour issues existing in the power sector.”

Chief Wogu assured Nigerian workers of the Federal Government’s commitment to implementing collective agreements, while encouraging the labour unions to further embrace the spirit of tripartism in the interest of the entire nation.

The Deputy President, NLC and General Secretary, National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE), Comrade Joe Ajaero, said in an interview with Saturday Tribune, “We have exercised enough patience. If you watch, the solders that took over the headquarters are the Presidential Guards and one starts wondering why Mr. President should allow that when industrial issues are still going on.”

Comments (1)

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malam
written by musa, August 12, 2012

FG have betrayed us. It will never work like this. We must get our right, this is just the begaining.

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