Warning Strike: We Have Recorded Success –Comrade Amoki
By Olusegun HOSEA. 6th Sept,2023
The leader of the Nigeria Labour Congress-NLC, Ondo State Chapter, Comrade Victor Amoko has said the two days warning strike declared by the National Executive Council of the Congress had recorded a great success here in Ondo State and in other parts of the Country as members complied to the directive of the Union. Comrade disclosed this today in Akure, the State Capital of Ondo State in an interactive section with the gentlemen of the Press in his Office located at Alagbaka when he was reacting to the question on the ongoing strike . Comrade Amoko said ” the NLC in the Nation is the one that has declared the two days warning strike and not the workers in the state .
He said the NLC at the State Council should monitored the level of the compliance of every afflicted Unions on the strike and I think that is what we have been doing since yesterday till today and we thank God how things has been going for the level of that compliance and I believe that report has been sent to the national head office on the level of the compliance of the affiliated Unions on that problems.
Its a successful one and we appreciate our members because they have been very calm despite the fact that their demanding for something that is very germane, they still maintain their peace in their level of demanding, so we are on it because it’s not yet over, so we are talking about two days , we have just spent one and a half days and the rest half a day will still be completed by God grace and that is it”
Speaking further, the Labour leader said the warning strike had been a successful one by all standard because of the level of the commitment shown by the Union members toward the strike despite the fact that it rained yesterday, yet the members still came out to show their level of commitment toward the warning strike . Comrade Amoko who said what Union embarked upon was a strike and not a rally, believed that most of the workers complied with the warning strike as most of them didn’t come to their offices for work.
He said where some of the offices gate were not locked, the Union helps them to locked them up so that nobody could have access to their offices to work. His words ” Like yesterday rain fell and we still strike. It’s a strike and not really and when we say strike you are not working and if you are at home ,you don’t come to the office and that is strike action.So when we move around we discover that the gates are lock and the one that were not lock, we locked it for them”.
Similarly, Comrade Amoko refuted the allegation leveled against the Union by the Trade Union Congress–TUC that his members were humiliating their members for not joining the strike. He said they are not humiliating anybody that was not their members . In his words ” It can’t be and there is no way we are going to humiliate those who are not our members and there is no way we are humiliating anybody. Ours is just to ask our members to stay at home and if we discover that some of people have not been doing that , we ask them to and that is what we called enforce and that was why I told you that some gates were open and we help them to shut it. We know , our members are to help them open and close the gate.. All those who usually open and close the gates, they are members of the NLC”.
In another development, the NLC Chairman debunked a rumour that was making around on the social media in a video that had gone viral that NLC members were going around with cane to flog people to complied with the strike.
According to him whenever there is crisis, there is every possibility for many things to come up and that is why nobody usually prayed for crisis to happen. When you have crisis, we have some sympathisers ,they would join you because they are sympathisers and most of these people would claims they are NLC man , because the name is not written at the fore head of any man”
He went further by saying that what the instructions said was for them to move around and see the level of the compliance of the members toward the strike of which they have done . He said the TUC members are not their members and as such there was no way his Union members could contact them to join the strike as both of them know where they belong to in time of the Unionism matters .
He said there is freedom of Association in Nigeria and so anybody could joined any Association he or she like as he believed that membership of any Association was a thing of interest.
On the issue of the Head of Service(HoS) in Ondo State asking all workers to go back to work through the issuance of internal memo to all workers.?. Comrade Amoko had this to say though I did not see such action happened but to every action there must be a reaction. That might be a samultanous reaction for what he believes but another thing I believe is that yesterday have come and it has gone and we are now in today . HoS, NLC and the government, we are under one umbrella “.
He said the action of the Head of Service could not set the NLC workers against the government because the NLC Ondo State is not in Asolation as they are working according to the directive of our National Headquarters who asked every affiliated Unions to observed a warning strike of which state Council should monitored. So, as such they didn’t offend any State government “.
Similarly, the labour Leader said that its good for us to be factual about the matter and not presuming. He said the removal of the fuel subsidy had brought about hardship to the workers and the entire populace in Nigerian. He said the entire populace are more than the workers . He explained that the workers in Nigeria are not up to three Million why the whole population of the country are almost three hundred Million people, so if the three Million are fighting for almost three hundred Million , he said there is need for us to appreciate those three Million that are fighting for the whole population of the country .
Amoko who condemned the ineffectiveness of the action of the Federal government in addressing the hardship brought to the Nigerians as a result of the removal of the fuel subsidy said the latter were not proactive enough in addressing the matter since five months ago that they have taken up the affairs of leadership of this country .
While appreciating the fact that Rome was not built in a day, Amoko said the government had yet to answered the demand of Nigerian workers while noting that those people at the House of the Representatives and Senate have been answered, why the workers and the populace have left un attended to . He said the Federal government was not sincere in their claims.
According to him, government promised given out five Billion to each state as a palliative to cushion the effect of the subsidy but end up releasing two Billion naira of which he believed the percentage was too low which was under estimate.
He said even the whole money promised by the government to each state was not enough let alone of releasing two Billion out of it and they pronounced that they have gave five Billion naira. He said what the government had done was to inserting the people against their state government. He said the whole money ought to have come first for the people to be working with it , before making pronouncement and more so two Billion naira was not the same as five Billon naira . Amoko said.
