Credit: Leadership.ng
The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Unions Congress (TUC) have suspended their strike scheduled for Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2023, being proposed to address the hardship generated by the removal of subsidy on the Premium Motor Spirit (PMS).
The labour suspended the strike to enable the Federal Government to have sufficient time to address their demands; hence the National Executive Council of NLC directed all its affiliate members to further direct their members to return to work on Oct 3, 2023.
Earlier NLC had directed its affiliate member unions across the country to mobilise and shut down the country because the government refused to stick to the seven-point demand made by NLC and TUC to ease the hardship facing workers and masses.
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On October I, both NLC and TUC met with the representative of the Federal Government at a meeting chaired by the Chief of Staff to the President, Right Honourable Femi Gbajabiamila, in an attempt to broker peace.
Following the meeting, both the NLC and TUC said they would consider the offers by the FG to suspend the planned strike to allow for further consultations on the implementation of the resolutions reached.
To avert the strike FG had announced the N25, 000 provisional wage increment for all treasury-paid FG workers for six months.
It also showed commitment to fast-tracking the provision of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) buses to ease public transportation difficulties associated with the removal of PMS subsidy.
Part of its commitments was also to provide funds for micro and small-scale enterprises, and VAT on diesel would be waived for the rest 6 months.
Likewise, it promised that it would commence the payment of N75,000 to 15 million households N25,000 per month for three months from October to December 2023.
On account of this commitment by the FG, the parties considered that the issues in dispute would be resolved when workers are at work and not when they embark on strike.
On the request for higher wage award demanded for by the labour, the FG team pledged to present the matter to President Bola Tinubu for further consideration.
The parties also agreed that a sub-committee would be constituted to work out the details of the implementation of all items for consideration regarding the government’s intervention to cushion the effect of fuel subsidy removal.
They reached an agreement that the lingering matter of the Road Transport Employees Association of Nigeria (RTEAN) and National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) in Lagos would be urgently addressed by Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State who was present in the meeting virtually.
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