By Bimbola Oyesola, [email protected]
Nigerian workers have entered the year 2022 with great expectations and hope coming from the background of what the year 2021 turned out to be, riddled with the dislocations occasioned by the novel coronavirus disease and the return of life, work and business to seeming normalcy.
The story for many Nigerian workers, including the business community, was not so rosy. Year 2021 was a year that many Nigerians would not forget in a hurry. The COVID-19 pandemic altered many things, ranging from the way of doing things to strict observance to restrictions on public gatherings and other strange ways, in fact, it is no longer business as usual for many people and countries.
The International Labour Organisation (ILO) director-general, Guy Ryder, had earlier warned about the ripple effects of COVID-19 in terms of job losses.
“The loss of working hours in 2021 because of the pandemic will be significantly higher than previously estimated, as a two-speed recovery between developed and developing nations threatens the global economy as a whole.
According to Ryder, ILO then projected that global hours worked in 2021 would be 4.3 per cent below pre-pandemic levels (the fourth quarter of 2019), the equivalent of 125 million full-time jobs. This represented a dramatic revision of the ILO’s June projection of 3.5 per cent or 100 million full-time jobs.
ILO warned in its eighth edition of the ILO Monitor: COVID-19 and the world of work, that, without concrete financial and technical support, a “great divergence” in employment recovery trends between developed and developing countries will persist.
“In the third quarter of 2021, total hours worked in high-income countries were 3.6 per cent lower than the fourth quarter of 2019. By contrast, the gap in low-income countries stood at 5.7 per cent and in lower-middle income countries, at 7.3 per cent.”
Similarly the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and a United Nations Development Programme survey revealed that nearly 3,000 businesses in the formal and informal sectors were shut down in Nigeria because of the pandemic. In March, the NBS said a third of Nigeria’s workers were out of job in the fourth quarter of 2020, a situation worsened by the pandemic.
This was further corroborated by the president of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Ayuba Wabba, in the NLC 2022 New Year Message, that, while some workers and Nigerians were able to regain their balance after the lifting of the lockdown associated with the COVID-19 outbreak, so many others are still unable to find their footing, especially workers who lost their jobs during and after the lockdown.
“We will continue to stand with workers who lost their means of livelihood to the COVID-19 pandemic by engaging in sustained social dialogue with employers, especially using the memorandum of understanding signed between organized labour and the employers’ association as a veritable advocacy tool,” the NLC president said.
According to Wabba, the socio-economic pains inflicted by the unprecedented lockdown in 2020 continued to manifest throughout 2021. The evident trails of the huge dislocation could be easily identified in the escalation and hyper-inflation of basic goods and services. Last year, 2021, Nigerians were exposed to the most turbulent and unpredictable market realities. A bag of beans that sold for about N18,000 in January 2021 currently sells for about N32,000. A bag of maize that used to sell for N9,000 at the beginning of 2021 soared to a new high of N18,000. The same for other staple food such as gari, rice, yam, cassava, palm oil and spices. With the increase in the prices of food items also came general inflation of other goods and services. The cumulative impact of the prevailing hyper-inflation on the static wages earned by workers can only be imagined.
The labour leader stated that, for many Nigerians, especially workers, the year 2021 would rather be forgotten in a hurry.
He noted that, while organized labour may not have complete control on market forces, with regard to inflation in the prices of essential goods and services, as a pan-Nigerian workers’ representative and mass-oriented movement, labour, through proactive engagement with government, was able to limit increases in the prices of very critical commodities and services such as petrol and electricity tariff.
The secretary-general of the Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN), Bashir Alade Lawal, opined that Nigerian workers were the worst hit in 2021, while the future equally looks bleak in 2022.
He said, “When you look at government policies, both the macro and the micro, they have not been friendly. It has affected prices of almost everything. Particularly the exchange rate of a dollar to about N576 is a criminal conspiracy against the people, most especially Nigerian workers.
“As we speak, the salary is nothing to write home about, and even in some some states it is not even coming as and when due. So, when you look at the totality of it, you will understand that nothing is working. And even when you look at it, an average Nigerian, most especially the graduates, their first priority now is to get out of the country. So, what does the future hold for us? We are not sounding as alarmists, but the truth is that things are not okay and Nigerian workers are the worst hit.
“Going by what is happening now, I see a bleak future. I don’t see much changes. If we want positive changes, we must sit right and do the right thing.”
President of the National Union of Chemical Footwear Rubber Leather and Non-Metallic Products Employees (NUCFRLANMPE), Goke Olatunji, similarly lamented the plight of workers in the nation’s economy in the year 2021.
“The economy was not friendly in 2021. It affected all. Most of our management were complaining; lots of closures, retrenchment. Our members are now drastically reduced. In the private sector, all of us are crying, chemical, food, we do discuss. Construction workers are now casuals, everyone is lamenting,” he said.
Kaduna shut down
The NLC, towards the end of 2020, had warned that it would fight against anti-workers tendencies and perceived government anti-masses policies in 2021, and hence did not waste time in implementing that plan by shutting down Kaduna State on May 17 for a five-day warning strike to protest the sacking of council workers by Governor Nasir el-Rufai.
Addressing civil servants in the state, Wabba vowed to ensure that the state government was brought to its knees until it reinstated the sacked workers. The strike was called off due to the intervention of the Federal Government.
Affiliates like the Academic Staff of Universities (ASUU), Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions (NASU), Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and the National Association of Academic Technologists (NAAT) equally had their own share of industrial actions.
Fuel, electricity price hike
In the course of the past one year, government made a number of attempts to increase the pump price of petrol and hike electricity tariff but organized labour stood in the way in the defense of the interests of Nigerian workers and the masses of the country.
Wabba said labour’s argument has been that there is a limit to the imposition of hardship and suffering on the fragile shoulders of the Nigerian people: “It is gratifying that amid the deteriorating conditions of living, organized labour was able to rise up to ensure that the masses of our people were not completely run over by market forces enabled by the anti-people policies of government and at the whims of shylock capitalists.”
Wabba warned the Federal Government against going ahead with its planned removal of subsidy on premium motor spirit (PMS), popularly called petrol, in 2022.
The congress criticised government’s policy on fuel importation, reiterating its readiness to shut down economic activities in the country should the APC-led government insist on increasing the price of PMS without due consideration.
Insisting on bringing back the four refineries to 100 per cent built-capacity, the NLC leader wondered why the Federal Government should be talking of importation of refined petroleum products to the detriment of local refineries that should generate numerous jobs for Nigerians.
“NLC has remained very consistent in its position about the issue of what we call subsidy. The position of NLC is that Nigeria has no reason to continue to import refined products for domestic use, particularly PMS, because we’ve also found out that we are the only member country of OPEC that is doing that.
“It’s an imposed policy on Nigeria, and our leaders must find a way and means to actually get us out of that imposition. We have made this point very clear, that, because of the devalued value of our currency, it then means that the policy of importation will continue to have a negative impact on consumers.
“We have seen that with kerosene, we have seen that also with diesel, which our government has claimed that they’ve been fully deregulated, but the price has never been at the reach of ordinary Nigerians. Kerosene has been taken out of the reach of Nigerians; it is now unaffordable product to people. Even with cooking gas; people are now using firewood.
“So, the position of NLC remains very consistent that we’ll be against any policy of removing subsidies in the name of deregulation if it is based on importation. By continued importation, Nigeria is creating jobs and wealth for other countries as our refineries remain under lock and key. It’s a patriotic position that many Nigerians have supported,” the labour leader said.
Expectations
Subsequently, the NLC has charged the Federal Government to ensure most of its policies are directed towards job creation, even as it lamented the loss of value of the naira.
Wabba decried the loss of purchasing power of average Nigerian workers, calling on government to come out with tangible job-creating policies to tame perceived increase in insecurity in 2022.
“The current high inflation is bad for businesses and the country’s development. It’s sad that Nigeria’s currency has lost its value.
“For instance, since 2015 till date, our currency has lost its value more than 150 per cent, when you compare it with our neighbouring countries such as Ghana, Togo and Benin Republic. In 2015, 1 million CFA was equivalent to N250,000 but today, one million CFA is equivalent to N1 million,” he said.
Wabba noted that, as a country with over 200 million population, Nigeria is expected to produce 80 per cent of its consumables, but the reverse is the case: “The 33 per cent unemployment figure was an understatement because we all know that we have an issue in this country when you talk about statistic and data. So, it’s above that figure. We need to understand that we have two categories of unemployment – uneducated and educated youths.”
Similarly, the president of Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA), Taiwo Adeniyi, called on the government to address the issue of insecurity, rising cost of food and transportation, low investment pattern, challenges in sourcing foreign exchange and rising inflation.
He said there would be improvement in performance of all sectors/sub-sectors if these are addressed.
He also lamented that the nation’s inflation rate hit a four-year peak in March 2021, as food prices jumped more than 20 per cent, heaping financial pressure on households already faced with a shrinking labour market and a challenged economy.
“The country’s external reserves fell to a 13-month low in June 2021, tumbling quickly to $33.8 billion, the level it was between 2015 and 2017,” he stressed.