MANY people may have forgotten the National Civil Society Coalition Against Third Term (NCSCAT). Between 2005 and 2006, the administration of ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo wanted to tinker with the constitution and introduce third term. It was NCSCAT that vociferously mounted advocacy that put National Assembly on it toes. The Obasanjo administration almost succeeded if not for the effort of NCSCAT.
NUFBTE Redemption group has been on the same advocacy since 2020 against Oyelekan’s tenure elongation in National Union of Food Beverages and Tobacco Employees (NUFBTE), but the National Administrative Committee (NAC) and National Executive Council (NEC) of NUFBTE, Nigerian Labour Congress, Ministry of Labour, Employers Federation: bodies and organisation that have both moral and statutory responsibility to intervene, have all decided to keep mute.
Adherence to the rule of law by the ruling class is a serious issue in Nigeria. The arbitrary use of position of authority and noncompliance to judicial decisions by government and influential Nigerians is fast becoming a norm. This shows that equality before, and supremacy of, the law is a process yet to be fully entrenched in our society.
As government at all levels are disobeying judicial decisions, privileged Nigerians are watching and imitating. Otherwise where will a man like Lateef Oyelekan, ably assisted by Comrade Ayuba Wabba, get the gut to disobey judicial order? There are actions that diminish a man, and when someone in public office engages in such actions, he diminishes his person and the office. How can the President of Nigeria Labour Congress accompany Comrade Lateef Oyelekan to a nocturnal conference that no other person within Nigerian labour circle deemed necessary to be part of?
All over the advanced Western world, democracy helps to enrich jurisprudence. The rule of law also serves as the pillar of democracy. It is just too bad that good things don’t work well here because people in authority always constitute a cog in the wheel of progress. How did we get to the level where a stark illiterate, an ordinary bottle washer in a bottle plant, can say no to judicial order, and nothing happens? What are lawyers and judges still doing in the court? Do they still have any job there?
We were taught that judiciary is the last hope of the common man. Is that still true in Nigeria? How can a citizen who disobeyed the decision of a competent court of records, still get rousing welcome in the Ministry of Labour? What message is the Ministry and its officials trying to pass to ordinary workers?
Despite all the intrigues , political calisthenics, nocturnal meetings , the Ghana-must-go bags that exchanged hands, the third term plot of Obasanjo government failed because the National Assembly woke up to the strident call of NCSCAT.
NUFBTE Redemption group has been on the same advocacy since 2020 against Oyelekan’s tenure elongation in National Union of Food Beverages and Tobacco Employees (NUFBTE), but the National Administrative Committee (NAC) and National Executive Council (NEC) of NUFBTE, Nigerian Labour Congress, Ministry of Labour, Employers Federation: bodies and organisation that have both moral and statutory responsibility to intervene, have all decided to keep mute.
We should not forget that we are in a society were nature of governance most often negate the rule of law and stretch state might to maintain personal political power. Our society is one that is prevalent with human rights violations and abuses. For a society like ours to emerge from the morass of man’s inhumanity to man, our working masses must be strong, both in character and in learning to be able to first of all engage labour leaders, before engaging state authorities and employers.
History will continue to be lenient with courageous people. I still remember Senator Saidu Dansadau; a courageous and principled man who was vehemently opposed to the third term plot. Senator Dansadau and some of his colleagues will continue to be remembered by enlightened Nigerians who followed events at that moment in our political history when dark clouds almost took over our political firmament.
How will labour history treat the NEC and NAC members of National Union of Food Beverages and Tobacco Employees? How will that history interpret the docility of NLC and Labour Ministry in the face of a spuriously festering crisis? Recalling this story makes me remember that few years ago; Oyelekan told us that ex-president Obasanjo is his relation. According to him both of them are from Owu in Abeokuta. In retrospect, I am tempted to believe that there is a correlation between Abeokuta and tenure elongation. Is it ancestral or just a coincidence? Considering the fact that Oyelekan has been alleged by some union members to have collected humongous amount of money from the union vault on the reason that he wants to buy a land and build a house near the ex-president in Abeokuta.
I learnt many years ago that when you put a poor man in a position of authority, the first thing he does is to enrich himself, and then destroy the system that produced him, and finally initiate crisis before absconding. Apart from a handful of labour leaders, majority of labour leaders of today are charlatans. This is a great tragedy because I can’t stop wondering how people with serious character flaws will be able to constructively engage state authorities and employers.
We should not forget that we are in a society were nature of governance most often negate the rule of law and stretch state might to maintain personal political power. Our society is one that is prevalent with human rights violations and abuses. For a society like ours to emerge from the morass of man’s inhumanity to man, our working masses must be strong, both in character and in learning to be able to first of all engage labour leaders, before engaging state authorities and employers.
Comrade Amechi is member of NUFBTE Redemption Group and writes from Lagos.
