TONY JOHN, Port Harcourt
The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) has threatened to sanction any worker under its affiliate, Organised Private Sector Union Forum in Rivers State, who boycotts today’s (Monday) planned strike action against fuel and electricity tariff price hike.
Chairman of the Forum, Temple Morford, who spoke in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, at the weekend, said policies of the Federal Government have put undue hardship on the workers in the country, which called for the rejection of the polices.
Morford said the group would set up a monitoring committee to monitor compliance across the state.
He said: “I hereby call on all workers of the private sector to join the strike action. They should make sure that there is total shutdown both land, air and sea. There should be no operations.
“The filling stations, transportation workers and all others should shut down under the private sector unions because Nigerians are being victimised and we cannot continue to be in our own country and be suffering while people from other countries that we give electricity supply enjoy 24 hours supply”, he noted.
Morford said the workers would downtools until government reverts the fuel price to N120 per litre.
He added that it was painful to note that foreign countries Nigeria supplies electricity on high fees, enjoy 24 hours of electricity supply, while the country gropes in darkness.
Morford declared: “Whosoever fails to comply with this decision, that person would be made to face the consequences of Nigeria Labour Congress. We would set up a monitoring team to checkmate those who would default the decision of the NEC.
“Whereby any of the sectors fails to comply, we would have no option than to deal decisively with that sector. Fuel price must come back to status quo. Let it go back to N120 per litre, where it was before”, he insisted.