NLC Criticises N50 Billion World Bank Loan

[Richard Akindele]

Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) President Adams Oshiomhole has criticised the Federal Government for allegedly obtaining a N50bn World Bank loan to pay-off 33,000 civil servants pencilled for retrenchment.

"We wish to state unequivocally our opposition to the resort to external borrowing of N50bn to finance the gratuities of the retrenched workers,"

Oshiomhole told a news conference. He said the loan was capable of taking the nation back to the dark days of debt overhang.

If government must borrow, he said, it must be for productive capital projects which do not include retrenchment.

The labour leader said "the country can not withstand the social consequences of throwing 33,000 workers into the labour market".

"In poverty terms, retrenching 33,000 civil servants will have implications for the survival of an additional 231,000 spouses and children as well as about 100,000 extended family dependents," he said.

Oshiomhole who faulted the procedure for the exercise by the Public Sector Reform Committee, said it disregarded due process, and was inconsistent with government's claim of meeting the highest corporate ethic.

"As an employer, government is bound by the Labour Act which provides for proper negotiation between employers and employees in the event of redundancy," he said.

Oshiomhole said "el-Rufai should realise that this is not about demolition of illegal buildings, but lives of able bodied men and women".

On why the NLC did not react earlier, he said the issue affected the unions directly, adding that it was only fair for them to be given a free hand to deliberate on the matter before the NLC.

"Now that the Joint Negotiating Councils of Unions (JNCU) have reached an agreement, NLC is in full support of their decision and would back them appropriately," he said.

This Day.