By Gift Samuel, The Sight News
In line with the plan of the Kaduna State Government to sack workers en masse,the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC has assured workers in the state that the Congress will resist any attempt to sack any worker without following due process.
Speaking to Newsmen on Friday in Abuja, the NLC President, Comrade Ayuba Wabba disclosed that the Kaduna State Government has earmarked about 30,000 workers to be laid off, consisting of 21,780 teachers already penned down to be sacked under the pretext that they failed competency test.
He added also that 5,000 local government workers are earmarked to be sacked under the Local Government Councils Restructuring Order 2017 and 8,000 more workers in Ministries, Departments and Agencies are to be sacked for sundry but unjustifiable reasons.
He decried the social consequences of adding 30,000 workers and their families to the number of unemployed people in Kaduna State alone, saying that it can better be imagined at a period when crime rate is growing at a frightening speed.
According to him; “Wednesday’s protest was to express our collective opposition to the anti-workers policies of Governor Nasir El-Rufai’s government in Kaduna state that are obviously directed at not just sacking workers enmasse but deepening poverty and deprivations as well as circumscribing the fundamental rights of the people, particularly workers in the state”.
Speaking on the competency test, the President said that; “the competency test was simply a sham as well as a premeditated action to reduce the workforce. The so called competency test was conducted without the relevant professional bodies regulating the teaching profession. But more especially it was done by a government with a prejudicial mind and intent.
“For instance, his government’s claim that the competency test conducted on the teachers in the State was transparent is not only false but shrouded in arrant fraud as we found out that some of those claimed to have passed the test were dead teachers as well as retired teachers who left service two years ago. Also included were school guards who were never engaged in teaching service”.
He noted that the teachers’ case is a disguise that must not be treated separately as the ultimate plan is to execute a wholesome mass sack, adding that the target is the entire civil service, local government, Ministries, Departments and agencies.
The NLC President also debunked allegation that workers caused damage to the property of the State House of Assembly while protesting the sack move on Wednesday, alleging that soon after the workers left, hoodlums were sent by the State Government to damage the property with intention to blackmail workers.
He assured all workers of the NLC’s support against any infringement on their rights
