The Nigeria Union of Local Governments Employees, NULGE, has threatened mass protest across the country if the National Assembly fails to give local governments the mush desired autonomy in the ongoing constitution amendment.
NULGE's National President, Comrade Ibrahim Khaleel, said autonomy for local councils, which he said was necessary for the nation's development, should not be toyed with by the lawmakers, especially that it "is the yearning of the majority of Nigerians."
Khaleel spoke in Ado Ekiti during the fifth Quadrennial State Delegate Conference of Ekiti State branch of the union, which witnessed a change of baton at Ekiti NULGE and the election of Comrade Bunmi Ajimoko, as the new state president.
The NULGE National President, who said voting against council autonomy by the National Assembly would be tantamount to subjugating the voice of the people, said the favourable resolution of the House of Representatives had raised hopes that the autonomy would be granted during the harmonisation of the position of the two National Assembly chambers.
He said NULGE would need to work on the lawmakers at the state Houses of Assembly to ensure the realisation of local government autonomy in the amendment process.
Khaleel lamented that the lukewarm attitude of the senators and governors on the autonomy issue had shown that ordinary strike would not be enough for the realisation of the agitation, hence the need to change gear to mass protest.
According to him, all the six geo-political zones voted in favour of local government autonomy during at the various public hearings organised by the Senate just as all the 360 federal constituencies in the country also voted in its favour.
The NULGE leader, who lauded the Ekiti State Governor, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, for the development witnessed in the state, urged him to urgently attend to all issues bothering on local government workers in the state.
In his address, Governor Fayemi, who assured that workers in the state would not be served below the benchmark, described workers as partners in the bid to move the state forward "along the line of the administration's critical rescue mission."
Fayemi, who was represented by the Labour Commissioner, Mr. Oluwole Ariyo said; "Let us leave politics to politicians. It will be better for the workers to sit back and savour the flavour of neutrality than to join in politicking, because we will invoke the necessary sections of the Public Service rules against anybody that violates it."
National Mirror