NLC Speaks On Issuing Strike Notice

Emmanuel Ugboaja, the General Secretary of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), has said that labour did not issue any strike notice.

Naija News reports that the Labour had concluded plans to embark on a strike action if the meeting with the federal government on payment of minimum wage end in deadlock.

Naija News recalls that the meeting was held on Tuesday, October 15 with the federal government and the NLC.

While reacting, the NLC general secretary said that Labour has not issued any notice of strike. This stand debunks the earlier report that has been making the rounds that labour was planning to embark on another strike.

While making the clarification on the sidelines of negotiations in Abuja last night, the general secretary explained that what the initial statement issued said was that labour could not guarantee industrial peace, if, after October 16, 2019, the Federal Government does not reconvene the meeting for the adjustment.

Ugboaja in his statement maintained that; “Labour has other avenues to ventilate its grievances and strike would only be a last resort.

Government and labour meanwhile yielded grounds in the negotiations yesterday, with talks scheduled to continue 2:00 p.m. today.

The government moved up from 11 per cent for Grade Levels (GL) 07-14 and 6.5 per cent for GL 15-17 to a new offer of 17 per cent for GL 07-09, 15 per cent for workers on GL 10-14, and 12 per cent for GL 15-17. Also, labour’s team shifted from 29 per cent to 25 for GL 07-14 and 24 per cent to 20 per cent for workers on GL 15-17.”

Responding to the development, Acting Head of Service, Folashade Yemi, said: “We have had a very peaceful engagement. But we discovered that there are some grey areas that need to be ironed out. By the grace of God, tomorrow, discussions will continue and we believe that we will be able to get everything resolved.”