Executive Director of the Civil Liberty Organization (CLO), Comrade Ibuchukwu Ezike has passed a vote of no confidence in the activities of Nigeria Labour Congress, (NLC), accusing its members of betraying the interest of those who were elected to fight their cause for their selfish interest.

What exactly is NLC agitating for?
The primary thing everybody is talking about is the minimum wage. Labour is demanding that the minimum wage should be N18,000 while the Federal Government is offering N17, 000 but that is not even the major issue because more than 70 or 80 per cent of Nigerians are not civil servants.

They are all workers in the public sector, the majority of Nigerians are not beneficiary of this N18,000, although some are dependent on the workers. We are talking about the collapse of government and infrastructure in Nigeria because when you look at the road, transport and power sector and the social service sector, everything has collapsed. The civil society insists that we cannot be talking about payment of the workers’ salary but issues that affect the entire Nigerians.

Nigeria is one of the richest countries in the world. There is no reason people should go to bed hungry. There is no reason the education of this country will not be the best in the world. The whole thing boils down to corruption. When money is appropriated for social services, it goes into the private pockets of some people in government. What we are saying is that we are not going to be asking for increment alone, let us look at the governance issue where a senator goes home with about N8,000 per hour and you are begging for only N18,000 for civil servants. Recently, they approved money for those who used the barrel of the gun to get into power and these are people whose families are entitled to pension when they die. Yet, they find it difficult to enhance the living conditions of Nigerian workers.

What effort have the civil societies put in place to reduce the cost of governance in Nigeria?
We in the civil societies are fighting to ensure that democracy works in Nigeria but the only setback is that corruption has been rooted in our system. The government only set up anti-graft agency that is fighting the enemies of the government and not the people. That is why in our latest meeting, we agreed that the time has come to fight for all associated problems that have collapsed the governance of this country. These include the bogus earnings by the National Assembly members, and other public office holders in Nigeria. At the level of CLO, we have already started discussing with our lawyer on the possibility of going to court to stop the assent of the president to the approval of the National Assembly on payment of entitlement to families of late leaders when people are queuing at the pension offices across the country for the pittance. There are people who retired in the past 15 years that have not been paid their gratuity and you are paying people who came to power in a lawless manner.

On the issue of the proposed pension for past leaders and their family, shouldn’t Nigeria see it as a way of appreciating the past leaders and their contribution to the growth of the nation?
There is no way you will justify that a woman or man who came to power by the barrel of gun should be paid an entitlement. It means you are justifying illegality. Even if people are to be paid, it is not those who came in through the barrel of the gun and there is no justification for you paying people who have served as senators in this country. Are we talking about the mass unemployment in the country that has caused a lot of problem in this society? We are talking about the younger generation, if you go out there, you will see young people roaming the streets. We are also going to challenge the bogus salary earned by the National Assembly members.

Is the amount canvassed by the Labour as minimum wage commensurate with the present economic situation in Nigeria?
For us in the civil liberty organization, the labour leaders are not honest. What justifies the demand of the working class people is the analysis. These civil servants are the ones that calculate the bogus payment for the so-called leaders and yet their take-home pay is nothing. If you go to the market with N18,000, you will come back with nothing, so the important thing is that they will sit down and analyze the indices, the resources available and come out with a genuine wage. This is not the kind of labour that Imoudu led in those days. Let them take a look at the history of the labour leaders, people who offered their lives for the good of the populace. It is like the present labour leaders did not do their homework very well, because they would have looked at all the strata of the economy and come out with a better demand.

What if government decides to prune down the number of those in its payroll since it is obvious that most civil servants are not productive?
If government decides to do that, the CLO should be the first the organization to go to court because we are talking about mass unemployment. We are talking about not sending people back to the street. It will create more social problems. So, we will not be part of any agenda by the government or any person to sack workers. It is just unacceptable. There was a governor of old Anambra State that used to move from one hospital to the other. He caught students who were going to school late on the streets. If you are the governor of a state, it means that you are the chief servant of the state. If you are the president of the country, you don’t just limit yourself to the comfort of the air conditioner. You move around and see the place you are governing. You move around and see how things are working. If the civil servants are not doing their work, then it is the failure of governance. If you say things are not going fine, you hold the leaders accountable.

You don’t go to the market to sell and then go to government to receive your salary. So, it is the failure of the government that civil servants are not working. If you have more than one teacher in a class in the urban centre, there are also 50 classes without a teacher in the rural areas while in the urban centres, there are five teachers to one class. So, why not transfer those teachers and civil servants who are converging on the urban centres to the rural community.

The Federal Government has requested that they be given up to November 25 to make a decision. Is it not fair on the part of NLC to grant the request?
Why shouldn’t the president listen to them? We are talking of the lives of Nigerian people till November 25, what does it take Mr. President to sign. As I said, what the NLC is asking for is a pittance compared to the resources of this country. If you go to other oil countries in the world, the citizens are well treated, free education, free medical services for everybody, good roads, quality education. There is no sector in this country doing exceptionally well. There is no country in the world that is paying as much tariff that people are paying in this country. So, where has the government stored the resources God has blessed this country with?

What is the way forward?
The way forward is that come 2011, we hope to elect a credible leader who will have the interest of this country at heart and wash away the disability and stigma that the previous leadership had placed on this country. We need credible leaders who are honest, who will stay in Nigeria and solve our problems and not run from one place to another. You cannot solve the problem of Nigeria because Obama is fraternizing with you. You have to sit down with Nigerians because we have the best brains.

http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/news/national/2010/nov/13/national-13-11-2010-013.htm

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