FG, Labour set 8 weeks deadline to finish discussion

The Federal Government and organized labor yesterday agreed on an eight-week timeframe to resolve all disputed issues and put labor demands’ resolutions into effect.

Recall that organized labor vowed to go on strike on May 29, just after President Bola Tinubu announced the elimination of the fuel subsidy. They claimed that the government had not taken any steps to mitigate the effects of the subsidy removal.

The federal administration swiftly called a meeting with labor to prevent a walkout, where palliative demands were made. The two parties agreed to meet again on June 19 to continue discussions.

The federal government, the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, and the Trade Union Congress, TUC, leadership agreed during the meeting yesterday that all of the issues and demands mentioned should be resolved within eight weeks.

A Presidential Steering Committee was also established by the two parties to act as a clearinghouse for the technical subcommittees on the many issues brought up.

Festus Osifo, the president of the TUC, and Joe Ajaero, the equivalent from the NLC, briefed State House reporters after the meeting and announced that the parties will meet again the following Monday to evaluate the framework put out.

He said; “We have concluded our meeting, if you remember very well the last time that we were here that labour, TUC, and NLC met with the government about two weeks ago, we agreed that we are going to reconvene today, that is the 19th of June, we just reconvened, we had a meeting although brief.

“The purpose of the meeting today is actually to put together the framework, what we submitted as our demand, how will they be delivered and so we are looking at that framework, the government came with what they think will work, we also made some input. From this night, we are going to continue the work in order to have that framework together.

“We agreed that anything we are putting together we are going to conclude everything in eight weeks. Everything must be rolled out within that time not something that we are going to leave endlessly. They have submitted the framework to us, we have looked at it, and we have made input to it, this night we will continuously work on it in order for us to come up with the deliverables.

“If you look at the communique that was signed in our last meeting, there are some action items in the communique. So it’s actually how these action items will be delivered. For example, we need to have a Presidential Steering Committee that will have to oversee everything.

‘’We also need to have Technical sub-committees because if we talk about the issue of CNG, we need experts, the issue of CNG you need those people that are willing to invest, the issue of CNG, you need the national oil company, the NNPCL to come up what they need to do and the time with which they are going to deliver.

“There are some technicalities that are required beyond this meeting, so those technical committees will be subsumed into Presidential committees but we must conclude everything maximum in eight weeks.

‘’So those technical committees, some will submit their reports in one week, when they submit in one week, we implement, when they submit in two weeks we will implement but the last should not exceed eight weeks.

“The terms of reference of these committees are going to be agreed on between today and tomorrow. We are looking at five broad technical committees that will be subsumed into Presidential Steering Committee. There must be timelines in these terms of reference but the maximum should not exceed eight weeks. By next week Monday, we will be here again, same time.”

Dele Alake, the Special Adviser to the President on Special Duties, Communication, and Strategies, added his voice to the conversation and stated that the meeting looked at short-, medium-, and long-term solutions to the problem with the administration.

He stated; “We reconvened today, both parties went through this list and we tipped off the viable ones, those things are broken into three categories. The immediate, are those that can be of low-hanging fruit in the short term, the medium term and the long term.

“So those list of demands in terms of implementation and execution fall into those three broad categories of short, medium and long term categories. So that’s what we decided today and other meetings will still be held in order to cross the t’s and dot the i’s.

“One group has been constituted at today’s meeting, there is a steering committee that will be like a clearing house, there are other groups set up comprising both parties, government and labour members and these groups will work together very harmoniously and efficiently to arrive at the final resolution of all these demands and what we call interventions.”

In attendance at the meeting are the delegations of the NLC, led by its President Joe Ajaero, the TUC, led by its President Festus Osifo, the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, the Special Adviser for Revenue, Zachaeus Adedeji, the Special Adviser for Energy, Olu Verheijen, and the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Labour and Employment, Kachallom Daju.

Other executives include Mele Kyari, Group Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited NNPCL, Gbenga Komolafe, Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, NUPRC, and Farouk Ahmed, CEO of the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority, NMDPRA.