Daily Times Workers Protest 15 Months Salary Arrears
By Akpan Unyime
Workers of the Daily Times of Nigeria Plc, Lagos yesterday protested the non-payment of 15 months salaries and arrears by the Bureau for Public Enterprises (BPE) even after Folio Communications Limited, the buyer of the company, had paid the N1.25 billion bid price.
The workers appealed to President Olusegun Obasanjo to call the Director General of the BPE, Dr. Julius Bala to order in the interest of all.
As early as 9.00a.m the staff of the company assembled the company's premises at Lateef Jakande road Agidingbi Ikeja where officials of the BPE, Folio Communication and the Management of the company were to have a crucial meeting to discuss the handing over on the 26th of this month.
The workers with placards, some of which read: Bala must go," "At 46, you cannot marry in Daily Times" disrupted the meeting the workers chanted war songs and anti-Bala slogan, shouting and calling the BPE boss "Ole", "Bala Ole!"
The protest which lasted for hours was led by the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Daily Times chapter, Mr Deinde Adefokun while the workers insisted that the meeting would not hold at the venue unless the outstanding arrears were paid by the BPE.
However, it took the intervention of the Lagos State Chairperson of NUJ Mrs Funke Fadugba to calm the restive workers who were crying for justice.
Fadugba, who addressed the workers, told them that the BPE had resolved to pay the lump of money before the handing over of the company to Folio Communications in two weeks time.
The NUJ chairman, however, told the workers to boycott work for the day in solidarity with the protest and demands, adding that an extra-ordinary chapel meeting of the union would hold on the 25th of this month, eve of the handing over, she said if the money was not paid by then, the workers would resuscitate the protest and fight for the injustice meted on them.
Earlier, in a communiqu� issued at the end the Daily Times NUJ Chapel meting, the workers said there was no reason whatsoever for BPE to foot-drag on the payment of "our salaries and entitlements, having received the bid amount of N1.25 billion from Folio Communications limited and N70 million from the sale of some company property."
The communiqu� signal by the chapel chairman, Mr Adefarahan and Secretary, Mr Ayo Bada added "Unless the BPE has lodged the proceeds into a private fixed deposit account for unmerited interest to the detriment of the lives and work are of workers, the understanding claims ought to have been paid by now."
The workers stated that it was inhuman and calls on the BPE to renege on its promise to provide a three-month transitional budget for the running of the company pending the time the new owners would take over.
"We therefore call on President Olusegun Obasanjo, the National Assembly, the National Council on Privatisation (NCP) and other well-meaning Nigerians to call the BPE Director General, Dr Julius Bola and his officials to order now in line with the principles of transparency, account ability and probity of the present administration," they said.
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