Author: National Record

“We need the power of the NLC/TUC to push the Government to adopt this Action Program. That will ensure that the poor majority of Nigerians do not suffer so much from a disease that was brought here by the corrupt elite flying in from London, Paris, New York and other places,” the CSOs stated in the revised summary

“We must leave no one behind in the response, and build universal social protection including floors, and universal health coverage. Income support must be expanded to meet the rising unemployment, with no barriers to access for informal and non-standard workers. This is the moment for necessary ambition, with no time for piecemeal solutions or programmes that exclude the needy with narrow targeting and shift risks onto workers alone.”

“While we focus on the victory ahead, we must also reflect on the lessons that the sobriety enforced by the Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting global lockdown offer. These lessons are also the lessons of Easter. Easter reminds us of God’s love for the whole world. Covid-19 reminds us of a shared humanity. We are in this together. Covid-19 reminds us that what touches the nose would soon touch the eyes. Rich countries, poor climes, developed economies, struggling societies, workers, owners of capital, politicians, peasants, aristocrats, artisans, are all affected by this global pandemic that fears neither class nor status.”

“But in all this, we need to sit down, we need to rethink. I think organised labour must sit up and decide how to engage the employers in order to mitigate the impact of this crisis. They must use the existing collective agreement to ensure that workers are paid”

There is no modern society in which everybody employs herself or himself. Ordinary people have internalised this and they are saying it! The victims have imbibed the ideology of their exploiters, the ideology of their class enemies – the explanations and ideas, the ideology that oppresses them, and imprisoned them at the level where they are; that’s the point that I am making.

“Nigeria has a very high self-employment rate. In terms of occupational proportions from a household perspective, my research showed that 41.4% of household members reported being own account self-employment, 26.5% in paid employment, 2.8% reported that they were employers of labour, 15.7% indicted that they were unemployed, while 13.6% reported being non-active in the labour force.”

“Governments must learn the lessons of the 2008 financial crisis where bailouts for banks and corporations were paid for by ordinary people as jobs were lost, wages flatlined and essential services such as healthcare cut to the bone. Economic stimulus packages must support ordinary workers and small businesses, and bail outs for big corporations must be conditional on action to build fairer, more sustainable economies.”

“Scientists in Africa and Latin America have been told by manufacturers that orders for vital testing kits cannot be filled for months, because the supply chain is in upheaval and almost everything they produce is going to America or Europe. All countries report steep price increases, from testing kits to masks.”

“Akanbi, who came third, is not only from Ilorin but is also the son of one of Ilorin’s prominent families. That’s the chief reason he was appointed VC. It’s inter-generational perpetuation of privilege with a dash of ethnic bigotry.”

“Post-COVID-19 reconstruction in the education sector should leverage on virtual learning using the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) approach as a key instrument of knowledge production and dissemination.”