United Labour Congress has called on the National Assembly to resurrect the bill criminalising the non-payment of salaries in Nigeria.
The union in its reaction to government’s no work no pay policy at the weekend stated that if workers’ salaries are guaranteed, the spate of strikes would surely reduce and the worries of the Minister of Labour, Dr Chris Ngige and that of the Federal Government would have been largely addressed.
“If the ministry has been able to appropriately tackle workplace grievances before they snowball into industrial crisis, we would not be talking about the increasing spate of strikes all over the nation. We hold the opinion that it is the inability of the Federal Ministry of Labour to put in place an effective mechanism for engaging workplace issues that has largely led to the crisis we see in the nation’s industrial space,” it stated.
The union in a statement by its president, Joe Ajaero, said the minister should address those real factors that threaten the terms and conditions of employment of the average Nigerian worker as well as those elements that make it difficult for employers of labour to respond quickly to demands of Nigerian workers before they are forced to embark on strike as a last resort.
