Effort of the main opposition party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) to strengthen its grip at one of the major power blocs in Nigeria, the organised labour, witnessed baptism of confusion and later ended in misadventure on Thursday, after the 11th National Delegates Conference of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) ended in a fiasco.
A competent source within the workers’ body told our Correspondent that the horse-trading started on Monday at the opening ceremony. Some workers had earlier protested the presence of the Edo State governor, Adams Oshiomhole, at the high table and demanded an explanation. However, nerves were later calmed, and the suspicious delegates pacified, after they were told that the Edo State governor was just one of the invited guests.
The dust generated by that had barely settled, when one of the presidential candidates alleged that the out-going NLC president Abdulwaheed Omar, and selected NLC top officials were holding a secret meeting with Oshiomhole in attendance somewhere in Abuja.
The aggrieved candidate said he and some of his supporters had allegedly stormed the venue of Omar’s meeting with Oshiomhole, but was allegedly assaulted by security aides of the governor. “One of the security personnel told us that we cannot see Oshiomhole, when we told him that we were supposed to be part of the meeting, the security personnel placed a call to Oshiomhole, and returned to tell us to leave and go and wait for the governor and Omar at NLC Headquarters.”
The source added that he was later told that the Edo State governor was actually working against the interest of the Nigerian workers. “We were told that APC had asked Adams Oshiomhole to come and buy the election in favour of one of the contestants, Ayuba Wabba, a northern candidate.”
Our source said crisis began at the International Conference Center Abuja, venue of the delegate conference almost 12 hours after voting commenced and some delegates noticed an unusual voting pattern. “Some aggrieved delegates threw decorum to the winds, hijacking and smashing ballot boxes that were to be used for the election of new executives for the umbrella labour body,” said the source.
It was gathered that some of the aggrieved candidates had alleged that the Medical and Health Workers Union of Nigeria who are loyal to Ayuba Wabba, one of the presidential candidates, had spent about 5 hours voting and thus raised prying eyes and it was later discovered that some of the ballot booklets contained multiple ballot papers for a single candidate.
Delegates supporting Joe Ajaero of the National Union of Electricity Employees and Igwe Achese, of the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (who earlier stepped down for Ajaero) and other delegates began to allege an orchestration and manipulation of the election by the outgoing NLC administration led Omar Abdulwahed to rig the election in favour of Wabba.
The delegates now swooped on the ballot boxes, destroying them and the ballot papers. Delegates began to scamper for safety after it was glaring the situation could degenerate. This situation brought the three-day conference to an unceremonious end.
The source said “if the labour movement can start manipulating electoral processes, what then is the hope of the common man in this country? Some workers’ unions were bringing in more ballot papers instead of one for each member. They were voting for over five hours; why? “This is very painful, the labour movement has never been so bastardized like this before, shame! shame,” quipped the source.
“Ajaero, was not reflected in some of the ballot papers, so if they give someone that paper he won’t be able to vote for him. They also alleged further that delegates of Medical and Health Workers Union of Nigeria had two ballot papers each for Ayuba, and voted for over five hours which was unusual. At that point they broke into solidarity songs and upturned the ballot boxes. They said they have evidence to prove their allegations.”
The source who is also one of the vice presidents of NLC, and a president of one of the industrial unions, added, “We thought we were going to have a fruitful and successful election but we never knew the elections were being rigged. A situation where a ballot booklet will contain a candidate’s name for up to three times; well, we’ll see what Nigerian workers are going to do. At the appropriate time we will address Nigerian workers to take their fate in their own hands.”
