The Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, has urged the Nigerian Labour Congress, and Trade Union Congress, TUC to return to the negotiation table with the federal government.
The unions had declared a nationwide strike on May 31, 2024 after they failed to reach an agreement with the federal government over the new minimum wage.
The magazine reported that the leadership of the NLC and TUC disclosed that the nationwide will be total until the federal government offered a realistic wage to the Nigerian workers.
Recall that the tripartite negotiation between the Organised Labour, federal, state government, and the private sector representatives broke down three days ago after the unions were offered N60,000 minimum wage which they rejected.
The workers are demanding N496,000.
On Sunday the Senate President Godswill Akpabio and state governors made efforts to avert the strike. The meeting that is currently going on in Abuja, the nation’s capital between the leadership of the NLC, TUC, and representatives of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum, NGF, have been on since afternoon.
But sources in the NLC and TUC informed the magazine that it’s almost impossible to stop the imminent strike.
Speaking on Sunday, Fagbemi said the strike is illegal, stressing that the minimum requirements for the strike to take have not been met by the NLC and TUC.
He cited Sections 41(1) and 42(1) of the Trade Disputes Act 2004 (as amended).
Fabemi also reminded the NCL and TUC of a subsisting interim injunctive order barring them from embarking on strike. The order was granted on June 5, 2023, he asserted.
He said, “I wish to further draw your attention to the fact that the conditions outlined by our national legislation for exercising the right to strike are in tandem with the International Labour Organization principles concerning the right to strike.
“It is the position of the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association that the obligation to give prior notice, obligation to have recourse to conciliation, mediation and (voluntary) arbitration procedures in industrial disputes, etc are prior prerequisites for declaring a strike.”
He appealed to the NLC and TUC to return to the negotiating table.
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