Follow Us on Google
BimbolaOyesola, [email protected]
Nigeria’s efforts to meet the new Sustainable Development Goals 17 of 2030 may be a mirage without cutting down on the excessive public holidays.
This was the view of stakeholders at a workshop on “Media as Change Agents in Industrial and Labour Relations,” organised by Labour Writers Association of Nigeria (LAWAN), in Ibadan, Oyo State, over the weekend.
Vice president of IndustriALL Global Union, Issa Aremu, said the most precious input factor in productivity was time and time management, whereas Nigeria spent most of its productive time on holidays.
“Nigeria parades highest number of public holidays on earth. Some of these holidays legitimize idleness rather than promoting decent work with respect to rest. No need for a free working day to “mark” Democracy Day, a day arbitrarily chosen by one man in office that could even fall on a Monday. Children should be in school on a Monday in the name of democracy. I agree with President Muhammadu Buhari’s message on the day that stressed the need for all Nigerians to embrace high productivity in their respective professions to increase the country’s economic growth and development. But it must start with simple things like time management. Avoid lateness.
“Nigeria works eight hours, five days a week. But on average, other 19 countries in our preferred club of 20 most developed countries, work longer hours, six days a week. Out of 365 days in a year, Nigeria is at rest for some 120 days.”
He also opined that, for federal government’s commitment to re-industrialise the economy through sustainable industrial policies to succeed, there is need to totally eradicate smuggling and dumping.
Specifically, organised labour, which welcomed the policies, especially the new Cotton, Textile and Garment (CTG) Policy, argued that Nigeria must improve on policy environment, education and technology to raise the nation’s output.
Aremu maintained that, for Nigeria to achieve the desired output as well as improve productivity, there is an urgent need to declare emergency in the energy sector.
Currently, he said, Nigeria falls below capacity in production, and considerable work needed to be done on national productivity.He mentioned the National Productivity Centre (NPC), where the challenge lies in stimulating institutional productivity.
The labour chief stated that as Nigeria marks its 60th independence anniversary this year, the need to be more productive to compete favourably is pertinent.
According to Aremu, there is no better time to raise the noise level of the production crisis than now. He declared that Nigeria was no longer the productive nation it used to be in the immediate post-colonial era of the 1960s and 1970s. He, therefore, called on members of LAWAN to be the change agents that Nigeria needs to produce what it consumes.
“Currently, we still consume what we do not produce; export raw materials that we should have turned to manufactured goods, import same products produced by others with tears. We import unemployment and export jobs. This must change. Productivity is an input/output relationship.
“We must incentivise productivity to make Nigeria productive. We must reward value addition, possibly more than we must damn value depletion, which is what corruption and graft is.
“LAWAN has a critical role in raising awareness about productivity,” he said.
Acknowledging the fact that productivity cannot improve in the mill without an efficient workforce, Aremu emphasised the need for staff competence and effectiveness. He said every worker should be educated to understand that he has a personal stake.
On how to improve productivity, he suggested that organisations must imbibe work culture and ethics, punctuality, avoid absenteeism, management prerogatives, motivate the workforce and follow and respect procedures, among others, in the fortunes and misfortunes of the organisation in which he works and earns his living.
In the past, according to him, organisations attached a lot more importance to capital, to the neglect of labour, but the situation has changed in favour of labour.
“Most organisations now recognise the fact that their most valuable asset is their workforce, because it is the effectiveness and efficiency of the employee that determines the organisation’s productivity level,” he said.
The executive director, International Press Centre (IPC), Lagos, Lanre Arogundade, who urged the labour reporters to be professional in all instances, also advised them to arm themselves with fact-checking and investigative tools in reporting industrial and labour issues, to develop focused and effective communication activities that promote the confidence in industrial/labour relations in the country.
