From Tony Osauzo, Benin
In compliance with the directive of its national headquarters, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), the Edo State Council, yesterday, picketed the Secretariat of the Labour Party (LP) at Ogbelaka Street, off Sakponba Road, Benin City, over alleged financial rascality and contempt of the NLC by the National Chairman of the party, Julius Abure.
The state Vice Chairman of the NLC, Suleiman Abubakar, who led the picketing, said their reason for the exercise was because Abure was running the party like his personal business.
A circular signed by Titus Amba and Chris Uyot, chairperson and secretary of the NLC Political Commission, respectively, and dated March 19, had directed that all the LP state secretariats should be picketed by state councils of the NLC following the face-off between the NLC and Abure-led LP.
Abubakar argued that the LP belongs to the NLC, therefore, it should be carried along in every decision and warned that the union would not allow Abure to impose any candidate on them as national chairman.
“We were directed across the 36 states of the federation to picket the LP offices across the states. We ought to have done the picketing on Wednesday as directed by the political commission of the NLC, but we couldn’t do that because we were unable to mobilise our members.
“The reason is that the National Chairman, Abure, is running the party like his personal property. Everybody should be carried along. He has announced the national convention and wants to hand-pick and impose a candidate on us. This is not the time to hand-pick and impose anybody.
“The way forward is for him to go to the national and resolve his differences with it. He must learn to play by the rules of the game. We are not being sponsored, nobody is sponsoring us,” he explained.
But, the state Publicity Secretary of LP, Sam Uroupa, said the NLC has abandoned its primary responsibility to Nigerian workers.
“It is supposed to be fighting for the interests of workers for a better living. It has left all these things and is now fighting a political party that is not in the government. Workers are suffering. Look at the current minimum wage, the cost of food stuff. Today, a lot of people cannot pay transport fare to their places of work. The NLC is not looking into that but fighting a political party.
“How many of them are card carrying members of the LP? For you to query what is happening in a political party, you must be a card carrying member, and also discharge your financial responsibility to the party. Many of them are in the PDP, others are in the APC. So, why are they concerned with the events in the Labour Party”, Uroupa queried.