By Bimbola Oyesola, [email protected]
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) at the weekend mandated the management of the Air Peace to allow its workers to be unionized within two weeks and remit all the check-off dues from 2016 to date, failing which the congress threatened industrial action.
The NLC, in a statement signed by Benson Upah, head of information and public affairs, said staff of the Air Peace Airline have been denied the basic right of unionizing, from 2016 to date.
“In light of this, Mr. Onyema is given two weeks to allow the staff of Air Peace to unionize. He should equally calculate and remit check-off dues from 2016 to date. If he fails to do this, he should be prepared to keep a date with the entire labour movement soon,” the statement read.
The statement was in reaction to the airline’s position on the ongoing strike in Imo State orchestrated by the two labour centres, the NLC and the Trade Union Congress (TUC).
The two labour centres directed their members to commence strike in Imo from Wednesday May 3, with a clause, “after seven days if no appreciable progress is made, all the affiliate unions of NLC and TUC will march down on Imo to enforce their rights.”
However, the management of Air Peace, Upah said, was personalizing the strike.
“We at the Nigeria Labour Congress and the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria are disappointed by the utterances and behaviour of Mr. Allen Onyema, CEO of Air Peace, who has put his personal business interest above the lives, welfare, safety, freedom and businesses of Imo State people,” the statement read.
The NLC described the attempt by the management of Air Peace to personalise the strike (by over 70 unions) and present the NLC president Joe Ajaero as scuttling the business interest of a fellow Igbo as a familiar sentimental card.
It noted that the ongoing strike was to protect the rights of workers and citizens, which is enshrined in the 1999 Constitution (as amended), corpus of Labour Laws, and African Charter on Fundamental Rights.
The NLC emphasised that the same law allows for unionization of the staff of Air Peace Airline, which have been denied this basic right from 2016: “We find it disgusting that, rather than address the fundamental issues that led to this avoidable strike, Mr. Onyema has called for sanctioning of Comrade Ajaero and manacling of the labour unions.”
The congress explained that the decision to resume the strike was taken at the meeting of the Joint Central Working Committees of the Nigeria Labour Congress and Trade Union Congress in Abuja on Monday, May 1, 2023.
The statement read, “The meeting took a report on how the Governor of Imo State, Mr. Hope Uzodinma, using thugs and agents of the state, interfered with, disrupted and scattered the commemoration ceremony of May Day organised by workers of Imo State after workers in protest of violations of their rights by the governor, refused to be part of the governor’s May Day ceremony.
“The meeting also took a report on how, in the course of the violent disruption by the thugs and agents of Uzodinma, several workers sustained injuries and had to flee for their lives.”
The labour centres said part of its resolution was to report the governor to the Federal Government and the International Labour Organisation (ILO).