LABOUR and human rights activist, Comrade Femi Aborisade, has advocated the formation of a labour-oriented party as an alternative to the existing political parties in Nigeria.
Aborisade made the call in Ibadan on Friday at the South-West Labour Summit organised by the Trade Union Congress (TUC).
The summit is entitled, “The Role of the Labour Movement in the Political Development and Democratic Enrichment of Nigeria in the 21st Century”.
Unlike current political parties, Aborisade says the nation needs a proletarian party (a labour-oriented political party) to look after workers’ interests.
According to him, the masses need a political party with programmes that support workers’ interests, allies of workers and segments of ordinary people.
“Though there’s a labour party in existence, its programmes need to be transformed to a proletarian party, pro-workers’ party in terms of policies, programmes and perspectives that it advocates.
“Ordinary workers should realise that poverty that pervades the nook and cranny of Nigeria today is a creation of politics, therefore, ordinary workers should take more interest in organising politically.
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“Trade union branches should draw up resolutions supportive of creating a party that has workers’ programmes.
“So, the critical challenge is to recruit more rank-and-file workers into the Labour Party (LP), beyond those leaders, some of whom actually have nothing to do with the labour tradition,” he said.
On the ongoing minimum wage negotiation, Aborisade said workers would never win the struggle unless backed with formidable strike actions, rallies and protests.
According to him, the government has not respected the labour unions enough in the ongoing negotiation.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Gov. Seyi Makinde said the summit was an avenue to find solutions to the welfare issues of their members.
Makinde, represented by his deputy, Chief Bayo Lawal, said that his government had always prioritised the welfare of the state workforce.
He cited the prompt payment of workers’ salaries on the 25th of every month as an example of his administration’s commitment to workers’ welfare.
He also mentioned the payment of the backlog of retirees’ gratuities, and the payment of N25,000 and N15,000 wage awards to workers and retirees respectively, among others.
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He said his administration would continue to call for collaborative efforts with labour unions to ensure workers got what was due to them always without rancour.
TUC President, Mr Festus Osifo, commended the South-West chapter of the union for organising the summit, saying it was timely.
Osifo said suggestions and recommendations drawn from the meeting would be adopted to benefit the union and the entire nation’s workforce.
Justifying the new wage demand, the TUC president says inflation has eroded what Nigerian workers are presently earning.
“Imagine where we were as a country in 2019 when minimum wage was discussed, how much was a bag of cement and a bag of rice in 2019?
“Similarly, how much did you use to eat launch in 2019 compared to how much you can use now?
“So, because of erosion in the value of our currency, there is the need for us to always sit down and negotiate on minimum wage,” he explained
Earlier, the TUC Chairman in Oyo State, Mr Bosun Olabiyi, said the summit was put together by all the six TUC chapters in the South-West.
This, he said, was to share ideas and deliberate on how to move the union forward for the betterment of all members.
NAN reports that the main theme of the summit is: Repositioning the Labour Movement Amid Economic Decline in Nigeria”. (NAN)
