Labour Unions Have a Point, but Strike is a Wrong Option
While writing my last post on May 29, 2023, the only thing I knew was going to happen was that based on current realities, petrol would sell around the N500.00 per litre corridor when subsidy is stopped, this happened already (I will share insights into pricing in a forthcoming article), but I did not think things would happen so fast. A statement was made, market reacted and it appears government is owning the unplanned reality already. Labour — The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), has however, also reacted, they have issued a threat to start a strike on Wednesday June 07, 2023 if prices were not reverted to pre-subsidy arrangement rates. Does Labour have valid points? Yes, they sure do and I align with them, but I am against going on strike. I will take these things in sequence.
I will like to be clear upfront on a couple of things;
1) The sudden rise in petrol price hit me hard like a lot of Nigerians too and I have been struggling with making adjustments to cope.
2) I am not a fan of labour unionism for the simple reason that the labour unions in Nigeria, rather than focus on welfare of their members, tend to focus on struggling with management on how to run their organisations. This approach may be excusable in the environment of state run enterprises, but in a capitalist environment, it is a big NO. Labour unions should focus on welfare of their members and not policy choices. I once asked to be removed from membership of a labour union in the financial institutions space because I was paying monthly dues of N5,000.00+ without seeing any value for it. I was threatened, but I stuck to my guns, they didn’t like it, but I had my way.
Back to NLC, I am of the opinion that they have a point with their agitation, but going on strike is counterproductive. The only strike action I ever agree with is one where they will agree to no work no pay and would also not disturb others from going about with their businesses. Going on strike and expecting to be paid is an “oga ta, oga o ta” syndrome. For those who do not understand that phrase, it simply means whether the master makes money or not, the wages of the servant will be paid. Also, the least we deserve now, is grounding of the economy. I do not see government back tracking on subsidy removal, punishing people who rely on daily running of the economy in order to survive is not a welcomed idea at this time. Things are hard already, shutting down the economy is not a bright idea.
Labour was right on two things;
a) That the president doesn’t have a unilateral power to say no more subsidy. It should have come after deliberation with the National Assembly or after a Federal Executive Council deliberation or via an Executive Order. I would be fair to president Tinubu on this. When he made the statement “subsidy is GONE”, it was not an order, it was a tough talk, but market reacted, motorists overwhelmed the filling stations, some outlets jerked their prices. At this point, government had either of two choices; back-track and begin to assure the people that the decision is not immediate. If this approach had been taken, it would not have been any better, market takes time to trust decisions, we would still be having daily agony trying to get petrol. The second option was to recognise that market is right and then play along. This is what government has done and it is why fuel that was scarce for about two days suddenly became available.
The second thing Labour was right about was that the people negotiating on behalf of government were without portfolios, therefore unknown. I was equally taken aback when I saw Mr. Dele Alake and Mr. Adams Oshiomole engaging with Labour and Mr. Alake speaking on behalf of government. Of course I did not see it as correct too, both of them do not have any known portfolio, so one cannot be sure of their capacity to engage. I believe government has corrected this henceforth.
Labour should direct its focus to how its members would survive the sudden rise in cost. Government has a lot of babies, infrastructure, security, education, health etc and if they are saying the burden of subsidy is affecting those areas, we cannot be selfishly, under the guise of fighting for workers, not also understand that government needs to provide those things. Workers welfare will not bring bridges, it won’t bring hospitals and won’t bring good schools, therefore, Labour needs to be circumspect and direct energy to engaging government on how workers would cope.
Before government would fully satisfy workers, Labour should also ask themselves what can be done for their members in the immediate. Every member of labour unions pay dues monthly, what exactly do they do with it? Do members pay them dues for the sole purpose of engaging in agitation? The Labour leaders, I dare say, see agitation as the only way they sustain their relevance to their members, so therefore, at every opportunity, they take the “showdown” route, an archaic approach. I remember that after the 2012 protest, government bought buses for Labour, there are many of those buses in a yard on Murtala Muhammed way in Yaba, Lagos. Have Labour thought of putting the buses on the road to help to ease movement of their members? Are members not meant to enjoy some support for paying dues all the while? Are dues only meant to support agitations? I asked these sort of questions when Association of Senior Staff of Banks, Insurance and Financial Institutions (ASSBIFI) were interviewing me for wanting to quit membership. I asked them if they had even ever sent end of year packages to their members. How can I pay you over N60,000.00 in a year and all you have to offer is to go on strike over management decisions? I believe Labour should deep its hands into its pockets for once for the welfare of its members pending when government rolls out cushions. Unfortunately, Labour itself, is mostly a cesspit of corruption, most of their leaders go for the bag, many times you see them vibrating on TV, it is all about sustaining their relevance because of free money they get from workers dues. Many of their leaders are not staff of any organisation, it is labour union that sustain their lifestyle, it is a career for many of them.
One other request from them is that it should not have been sudden. Well, my take is that whatever decision we decided to take would have been a bitter pill. Stopping subsidy is a bitter pill just as not stopping it. There is no sweet way to deal with it, we have been at it for many years while bleeding under the burden of how much it costs us. If we are incurring over N200bn monthly to make petrol cheap and a well celebrated second Niger Bridge was only around N210bn, we have simply been eating many bridges away. The capacity of government to spend is limited to revenue it makes, when we do not have enough revenue, we borrow. We have borrowed so much in the last eight years to deliver some infrastructure, it is not a sustainable approach when we can cut cost from how much we pay in lifestyle subsidy to deliver many of those infrastructure.
I would advise Labour to rethink its approach, come to the aid of its members in the meantime and engage government on what they want done to ease burden on their members. The number of government workers, federal and state should not exceed te 3 million in my on estimation, I do not think it is right for them to hold us all to ransom. There is a larger part of the society that deserve good hospitals, good roads, good schools, we cannot deny them because probably less than 2 million people want increase in salaries. If the rural farmer has security and is able to take his goods to the market on a motorable road, food should be affordable for more people. By the way, agriculture is the largest employer of labour in Nigeria today, in fact, it is the main stay of our economy, even though oil remains the highest source of revenue for the country. A lot more families are sustained by the agriculture value chain.
Lastly, government needs to be open, avoid a “know it all” approach, communicate and act with speed in order for people to trust its policy decisions on subsidy removal.
God bless Nigeria.
