The Tinubu Stakeholders Forum (TSF) has accused the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) of blackmailing the government with the threat to shut down the economy for selfish and unwarranted reasons.
In a statement signed by its Chairman Ahmad Sajoh and Secretary Afolabi Joshua, the group argued that there was no basis for NLC to issue a strike threat over a strictly security matter which have nothing to do with the workforce.
TSF said: “The recent threat by the National Executive Council of one of the apex labour centres in Nigeria speaks volumes about how criminality is being condoned and gradually becoming a norm in the country.
“For us, it beggars belief that the power of strike is being used to oppose the legitimate demand by security operatives for the Nigeria Labour Congress to account to the country on matters of national security.
“To put the matter in context, Nigerians need to understand the circumstances that led to inviting the NLC leadership to answer questions relating to an alleged security breach within their premises.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the Labour House otherwise called Pascal Bafyau House is in the custody of the NLC as the landlord but it is also a matter of fact that several other tenants are occupying the spaces within the complex on rental basis.
“Ordinarily when a tenant is involved in a matter that is considered a breach of the extant laws of the land, the location of such persons do not provide immunity from arrest or apprehension except if it is a foreign embassy which the Labour House cannot claim to be.
“So, it is perfectly legitimate for security agencies to ask a landlord to clarify matters related to a tenant who is under investigation.
“There is nothing wrong with that. Every responsible landlord should be happy to provide information that will guide security operatives to either confirm their suspicions or clear a tenant wrongfully accused.
“Nothing is wrong with that. It should, however, be noted that it was the NLC leadership that raised suspicion on themselves by their actions when the police raided the place in search of the suspect now at large.”
TSF also raised posers on the attitude of NLC in response to a raid that has nothing to do with its office in the complex or with the labour union.
“It knew that the raid had nothing to do with the portion of the complex they occupy. They knew that it had nothing to do with their officials or staff. They knew that the person whose premises were visited was their tenant. Why then did they misled Nigerians by claiming the visit was to arrest them?
“Why did they deliberately provide a connection between them and the person concerned? And even when it turned out that the security operatives never targeted them during the raid, why didn’t they quickly correct the erroneous impression they created?
“These are legitimate questions they ought to answer in addition to the fact that they must provide information on their tenant as law abiding landlords.
“To blackmail the government with a threat to go on strike over a simple security matter which ordinarily they are obligated to provide information on, smirks of attempts to obstruct the course of justice.
“We are urging NLC to stop using the power of strike to subvert anything done by its leadership that could be wrong. That is not promoting workers’ interests but rather indulging the self-serving interests of their leaders being masqueraded as workers’ interests.
“No sane system should tolerate that. The NLC leadership must answer for the breach of national security within their premises by providing information on the fugitive tenant who is at present on the run, it added.
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