While we pay homage in respect of the sacrifice of our nurses in the current war against Covid-19, we reiterate our earlier calls for the government and healthcare managers across our country and other climes world over to pay attention to the voice of silent sobs by our nurses who go to war without adequate personal protective gear, conducive work environment and an impossible work schedule.
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The press statement, signed by Comrade Ayuba Wabba, President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Comrade Quadri Olaleye, President of the Trade Union Congress (TUC), revealed that at the moment, there are about 300 health workers “exposed or infected with Covid-19.”
Participants resolved to hold the meeting on “bimonthly basis” with focus of the next meeting being on the impact of covid-19 on the healthcare sector. Towards this theme, national centres were urged to prepare country reports with special focus of government’s initiatives directed at responding to covid-19 that will have general impact on the health sector. OTUWA was also urged to ensure that selected health sector unions in the sub-region are involved in the next meeting.
Billions of people have been left without social protection and are at grave risk from the devastating health and the economic effects of this crisis. Now is the time for global cooperation to fund social protection for all. The world cannot turn its back on those most in need now or in reconstruction of an inclusive and resilient future.
This is why the ITUC is calling for a New Social Contract – the ILO Centenary Declaration is a solid foundation for this
Fifty-two years ago, Martin Luther King, in a speech to striking sanitation workers on the eve of his assassination reminded the world that there is dignity in all labour. Today, the virus has similarly highlighted the always essential role of the working heroes of this pandemic. People who are usually invisible, unconsidered, undervalued, even ignored. Health and care workers, cleaners, supermarket cashiers, transport staff – too often numbered among the ranks of the working poor and the insecure.
Today the denial of dignity to these, and to millions of others, stand as a symbol of past policy failures and our future responsibilities.
An open manifestation of the crackdown occurred on the night of Sunday, 2nd February 2020 when, at about 9pm, the state secretariat of NLC was sealed by security agencies on the orders of the state government on the allegation that the building needed to undergo proper integrity test and therefore must be closed for officials to carry out the exercise.
The invasion of the corona virus pandemic has altered the world the way we know it. Our world will never remain the same again. The contemporary world of work is in dire straits. There are even greater fears on the future of work. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) has reported that the COVID-19 social lockdown measures have affected almost 2.7 billion workers worldwide. This represents around 81 per cent of the world’s workforce. In these circumstances, businesses across a range of economic sectors are facing catastrophic losses. The threats to operations and solvency, among smaller enterprises, make millions of workers vulnerable to income loss and layoffs.
“COVID-19 has reminded us in a forceful way that health is a fundamental right and attribute that we must all enjoy to be able to have a meaningful life. This pandemic provides us the lesson that we must prioritize the universal right to health and place it at the heart of the workers’ struggle. We recall the constitution of the World Health Organization that recognizes health for all as a fundamental condition for peace and security in the world. COVID-19 teaches clearly that we need the cooperation of all persons and states to achieve health security for the world and its people.”
While the immediate task is to find how to cope with the hardships imposed by income challenges, the medium and long terms pose a different kind of challenge. This is the fact that the world of work is being remodelled via the present constraints against physical congregations at work. This emerging world – a virtual world – portends an early arrival of the future of work that has been much hyped in recent times.
This was revealed in a terse WhatsApp text by Comrade Max Conteh, the Acting General Secretary of SLLC, to an ITUC-Africa whatsApp platform stating that Comrade Wright had passed on some hours ago from an undisclosed illness.