Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) warned yesterday President Goodluck Jonathan is perfecting plans to break up the congress by registering a splinter group in its to weaken opposition to government's various "anti people" policies. NLC claimed that the government is using its former Secretary General John Odah, who was sack in a controversial circumstance last year to create the splinter group under the umbrella of Integrity Group.
Odah's sack created a friction in the congress leading to about seven unions forming what they called the integrity group, with President of the Hospitality Union, Comrade Leke Success as its interim leader.
The unions that make up the group are National Union of Hotel and Personal Services Workers (NUHPSW), Non Academic Staff Union (NASU), National Association of Academic Technologists (NAAT), Radio, Television, Theatre and Arts Workers Union (RATTAWU), National Union of Banks, Insurance and Financial Institutions Employees, (NUBIFIE), Academic Staff Union of Research Institutes (ASURI) and Steel and Engineering Workers Union of Nigeria (SEWUN).
However, the NLC through its Acting General Secretary Comrade Owei Lakemfa, said the congress "finds it quite necessary to draw President Goodluck Jonathan's attention to moves by functionaries of his administration to create avoidable labour and political crises in the country by seeking to break up the Congress and impose a new regime of fuel price hikes on the country.
"These hawks in government who see the NLC as being too powerful and capable of checkmating undemocratic and unpatriotic moves by the political class, have come to the conclusion that the best way out is to engineer internal 'disagreements' in the NLC, and hiding under this guise, to register a new labour centre which they hope will support anti-people policies and cause distractions in the labour movement. These government agents have even fixed July 2012 as the registration date of their proposed new labour centre," he said.
Comrade Leke Success in a telephone conversation with Daily Trust denied that the Integrity Group has filed any request for registration, stressing that it is a democratic right of any group that wants to do so.
"I have not heard or seen any report on that but I can only confirm what I read or see. I will only comment when I watch or read it tomorrow. But we have not filed for any registration yet. Is registration done in the bedroom?
"However, even if a group files for registration, is it not a democracy? Registering a centre is a democratic right but I will not say anything now until I read the text."
Speaking off record, an arrow head of the Integrity Group added nobody or even government that can stop the registration of more labour centres.
He said "people who know the labour laws of this country should know that the labour laws allow for multiple centres and that nobody, either government or any union can stop any trade union from forming a centre if it meets the requirements of the law.
When asked if the registration of a new centre is not a ploy to break the ranks of labour, he said "which ranks, rank of injustice being perpetrated by the NLC? There is a crisis."
Attempts to reach the Minister of Labour and Productivity Chief Emeka Wogu were unsuccessful for he neither picked a call nor replied to a text message by Daily Trust reporter.
Daily Trust