*PDP in dilemma, says Ogbeh
ENUGU—PRESIDENT of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, yesterday took the mobilisation of Nigerians for the October 11 planned nationwide strike against the recent hike in pump price of petroleum products to Enugu where he charged Nigerian workers and masses to proceed with the strike even if the leadership of the congress and other labour leaders are arrested. He spoke at the 2nd Quadrennial Delegates Conference of the National Union of Chemical, Footwear, Rubber, Leather and Non-Metallic Products Employees (NUCFRLANMPE) in Enugu.
However, Labour Minister, Alhaji Hassan Lawal, described Oshiomhole’s call for strike as contempt of court, and National Chairman of the ruling PDP, Chief Audu Ogbeh, said the party was in a dilemma over NLC threat to go on strike.
Oshiomhole said the Nigerian masses should rely on Section 40 of the 1999 Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria, which guarantees freedom of expression and assembly to render null and void the judgement of Justice Roseline Ukeje against the NLC.
The NLC president lamented that it was sad that the nation’s political leaders would shield themselves from the negative consequences of their mismanagement of the Nigerian economy by telling the people to make sacrifices for benefits not insight, stressing that what was at stake was our future because these leaders had wasted our yesterday and today.
Reacting to media reports that he might be arrested and kept in protective custody any moment from now to abort the planned strike, Oshiomhole said: “I am already a prisoner; the day I cannot in clear conscience speak my mind and become a prisoner; the day I cannot in clean conscience mobilise against injustice, I am a prisoner. The day I cannot in clean conscience fight against bad governance and you are a prisoner the day you see what is wrong and you refuse to talk.
“Therefore, to remain in a prison with endless sentence is more dehumanising than to be convicted for a specific prison term. In any case, no one is making history by going to prison. One of the best ways to show that this government can’t get any benefit from Justice Ukeje’s judgement is to make sure that we as free citizens of Nigeria take full advantage to withdraw our collective democratic account under Section 40 of the constitution, which is full of all democratic currencies to reject the fuel price increase and we are going to protest it. As Nigerians, we have rejected it and on October 11 we will ask the question: Who owns the land?
PDP in dilemma—OGBEH
National Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Audu Ogbeh, said yesterday that the party was in a dilemma over what to do with the fuel price, which has resulted in a threat of planned protest by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC).
Chief Ogbhe, however, said machinery had been put in place to dialogue with the NLC over the threatened planned mass action. Chief Ogbeh told journalists after a meeting with members of the diplomatic corps that the deregulation of downstream sector had put the nation in a dilemma. According to him, “we did not talk about that but we are in this dilemma."
