Joe Ajaero says government is riding roughshod on the people because Nigerians are so docile
Explains why Labour won’t intervene in the Naira, fuel scarcity crisis
On Wednesday, February 8, 2023, at its 13th National Delegates’ Conference at the International Conference Centre, Abuja, Comrade Joe Ajaero, Deputy National President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), made history not only as the first NLC President to be elected unopposed (he was a consensus candidate), but also the first NLC President elected from the defunct Eastern Region, comprising present-day Southeast region and most of South-South.
Then, five days after that historic moment, Ajaero, former General Secretary of the Nigerian Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) sat down with IKECHUKWU AMAECHI, in his former Lagos office for an exclusive interview.
Ajaero discussed the labour movement in Nigeria, what Nigerians should expect of his presidency, plight of Nigerian workers and the upcoming elections. He was analytical, measured in his responses and came across as a deep thinker.
How do you feel as the President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), particularly considering that this is the first time someone from the old Eastern Region is occupying that position.
I feel like any other normal human being. I feel happy that I have been given the opportunity and the platform to do all those things I have been aspiring to do and to contribute to the promotion of the interest and improvement of the welfare of the workers and by extension the masses of this nation. That is exactly how I feel.
This is the first time the NLC President is emerging by consensus. Was it by design?
Well, you can see that I wasn’t the organiser of the delegates’ conference. I couldn’t have been an aspirant and organiser at the same time. The organisers under the leadership of Comrade Ayuba Wabba did an excellent job to ensure that the election was seamless. They planned to have a seamless transition and in the process, colleagues allowed reason to prevail because in anything that has to do with elections, people show ambition, which is natural.
But to now subject that ambition to common interest, to subsume it to the greater interest of all so that the organisation can work very well is another thing. That was what played out. It is equally a vote of confidence that even when you are not yet in the position, your colleagues agreed that yes, this man can perform, therefore, let him serve us in this position. If they had doubts, there wouldn’t have been any consensus.
If the outgone executive or the president succumbed to pressure, that wouldn’t have happened. They allowed the process to play out transparently and the outcome is what you are seeing today – the Joe Ajaero presidency. And that is the more reason why we will not disappoint them because they have passed a vote of confidence in our leadership and our ability to deliver. That is the meaning of being elected NLC President unopposed.
Considering the crisis that erupted after the 2015 election when you lost to Comrade Ayuba Wabba, which subsequently led to a split, do you see your election as an indication that all is now well with the Labour family? Or is this part of the agreement that led to your faction coming back to the mainstream NLC?
One good thing that happened was that there was no agreement before we came back. And this is about two years since reconciliation took place. And after that reconciliation, there was healing. So, in the last two years, we have been united, working together as one family before this election climaxed the whole process.
From the moment we came back, nobody was seeing it as we and them. This election has also finally dispelled any other lingering doubt as to whether we are actually together. If there was any mutual suspicion before now, that has been cleared.
But let me say this, the NLC has an inbuilt process through which crises are resolved. Some of these crises could be internal or external. In 1988, a similar crisis erupted during the NLC conference. There were two tendencies – one led by Daggai Sharman of the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) and another one led by Ali Chiroma of the Medical and Health Workers Union. So between 1988 and now, the two unions again had this same misunderstanding.
But unlike the crisis of 2015, that of 1988 snowballed into a struggle to take over the NLC secretariat on Olajuwon Street, Ojuelegba, here in Lagos. And there was fighting, which prompted the Ibrahim Babangida government to take over and appointed a sole administrator.
That was why some people claimed that the Babangida regime funded the two factions then in order to achieve his aim. He didn’t just want to come directly to dissolve the NLC but he supported the various groups and eventually dissolved the NLC. But when NLC wanted to come together again, they were able to put that behind them. What the NLC did was to ask Ali Chiroma and Sherman to stay away from contesting for the presidency again and they now moved ahead to pick Paschal Bafyau. That was how Bafyau became NLC President. He wasn’t any of the strong forces in NLC and that was how the crisis was resolved and there was healing.
But this time around, on our own, through our internal mechanism, we resolved the crisis and came back together even before this conference that produced our leadership. That cemented the healing process.
There seems to be an age-long rivalry between the National Union of Electricity Employees and Medical and Health Workers Union. The infighting that led to the crisis in 1988 was between the two, so also the 2015 crisis. What is it between the two unions?
I think it is more of a coincidence. There is no rivalry, natural or otherwise. And before this leadership challenge issue came up, the unions used to be in one group, working together. Even the conference before the one of 2015, I worked together with Ayuba Wabba for us to bring Wahab Omar back. So, we have been working together. That is why I said it was a matter of coincidence.
And the fact that the first disagreement in 1988 was externally induced by Babangida was clear. And even the product of that reconciliation, Paschal Bafyau, you cannot remove IBB from that game because IBB and Bafyau did not hide it from anyone that they had been childhood friends, That was why throughout IBB’s regime, Paschal Bafyau will prefer to go and get whatever Labour wanted from IBB rather than going on strike. And he was doing it perfectly well. If workers are asking for a N100 minimum wage, Bafyau will tell you, let me go and talk to Ibrahim and he will get it.
And that was what informed NLC seeming to have recorded a lot of achievements, particularly capital projects under Paschal Bafyau more than any other labour leader. The Labour House was built under him, the Labour City Transport was under him. We used to have a Labour Bank. We were even thinking of Labour College before his administration was cut short.
He happened to be a leader that was majorly misunderstood. But he had direct access to Aso Rock. Even when MKO Abiola was detained, Paschal went and got bail for him, although they said the bail was conditional and Abiola rejected it and the rest is now history. But that showed you the extent he could move to get whatever he felt was good for the people.
Who amongst past Labour leaders do you see as your role model?
The issue of role model in the Labour movement is not something you see from the prism of black and white. Each of the leaders had unique qualities – strong points and weak points – and they operated under different milieus with peculiar challenges and opportunities. I was just telling you now about Paschal Bafyau. In terms of infrastructure, even political education, Paschal was tops in the sense that apart from what happened during the colonial days, the first Labour Party in the 1980s was organised by him. When Babangida was registering political parties, Labour Party was second or third. He moved round the nation mobilising for the political party. And he had in the curriculum of the NLC, labour and politics which was taught all around.
But he was the most criticised Labour leader especially from people outside the Labour movement. If you mention his name, people will hiss. Because he was seen to be hobnobbing with the military, people thought that he must have made so much money, including the alleged Osborne property in Lagos. But when Paschal died, we contributed money in the NLC to buy a small generator for his house. We contributed money to pay rent for his family in Abuja. Just about three months ago, the NLC was able to contribute money to buy a property for the widow and children. Paschal didn’t have any property in Abuja. Yet, that was the same man that people saw as the most corrupt NLC leader.
Comrade Hassan Sunmonu started the modern NLC around 1978. He confronted the worst of military dictators in the country and forged a serious alliance with the students’ community. He was so daring during the ‘Ali Must Go’ brouhaha and withstood the military. Every Labour leader in this country knew that Hassan Sunmonu was a material that we must all make reference to in all ramifications.
When Comrade Adams Oshiomhole came, he brought another face to the struggle. He took most of the struggle outside the trade union demands to issues that had mass appeal to the greater population of Nigerians like the fuel subsidy protests. Oshiomhole’s political consciousness wasn’t as much as Paschal Bafyau’s but he later became a governor and chairman of a ruling political party. But within the trade union circle, we knew that Paschal Bafyau was the real deal in politics.
Omar came and did his bit.
Ayuba was a transformational leader. When he became the president of the Medical and Health Workers Union, it was difficult to even pay retirees of that union. They were still in a rented apartment, clearly the underdogs but by the time he was there for four to eight years, even as at the time we went for this last conference, the union was now paying the highest dues. They became so vibrant and buoyant and had a lot of investments. They have about two or three hotels in Abuja today, the hospital they are building in Abuja will take over 200 beds. So, he transformed the union and it became economically viable. And he brought the same vibrancy to the NLC leadership and to a large extent, even with some limitations, we just commissioned one property – Hassan Sunmonu Court – a 38-room building.
So, if you now take all these into consideration because it is a combination, no leader drives the NLC based on his own initiatives alone. No, that is not how NLC works. The organs of the Congress take a decision which the President drives. If tomorrow as the President, I want to go to the streets, and the organs decide to meet and say you cannot go to the streets, there is nothing the President can do about it even if going to the streets is the best thing that could happen to Nigeria.
So, the organs have a way of moderating the actions of the President. None of the NLC presidents acted in isolation. Their actions are always based on the collective position canvassed by the NLC. But if you can pick from here and there, we saw Ali Chiroma as very courageous and daring. When the military threatened to arrest him, he said, why don’t you come now. So, in terms of courage, he was one of the most courageous leaders NLC ever had. So, each of them had his own strong attributes. What one has to do is borrow from all these strong points – the one on investment, the one on courage, and the ones that are political, and those that had policies with mass appeal, that will be fine because a combination of all these will assist us in determining where to go.
Nigerians used to look up to the NLC to champion the cause of the oppressed even in the tyrannical military era. You just spoke about Hassan Sunmonu and Ali Chiroma as exemplars in courage. But NLC in recent times seem to have lost the trust of the people. Petrol prices are increased every day and electricity tariff is hiked capriciously by the government, yet there is no whimper from the NLC. Is it a question of being battle-fatigue or the leadership of the congress has been compromised? There are many who say that the NLC is of no use to the average Nigeria worker today.
Well, there are things that don’t have alternative. The issue of NLC to the generality of Nigerian workers is something that has no alternative. If the NLC is not there, what will be there? What will serve Nigerian workers? Even the weakest NLC is better than no NLC at all.
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But most of these criticisms are not coming from the workers and their unions, they are coming from people who don’t understand the workings of the NLC. Let us take the issue of power for instance. If we are shouting now that there is no electricity, and Nigerians want the NLC to intervene through protest and Labour meets and decides not to, they have their good reasons for that. So, that is the situation.
What do you see as the greatest challenge facing the NLC now?
You cannot isolate the NLC from the challenges of the country. As at today, we have this challenge of scarcity of cash which is affecting the Nigerian worker. When we are saying that the worker doesn’t have enough, even the little that he getting, even that N1,000 that he has, to access it is very problematic. That is one.
Second, even when he manages to access it, the purchasing power has been grossly eroded based on inflation and other factors. You can see that to buy petrol now is a problem. A worker’s salary of N20,000 or N30,000 could go into buying fuel because of the cost of PMS. The worker’s salary of N20,000 or N30,000 could go into paying electricity tariff and it won’t even be enough. And these are challenges that are real. They are not only affecting the worker, they are affecting the generality of the populace.
And whatever is affecting the Nigerian worker is affecting the NLC. So, this is already a burden that the NLC must carry. That is the greatest burden as I see it.
And then, the issue of minimum wage, the pay that cannot take you home. When you compare the minimum wage with the cost of living, it cannot balance. So, these are some of the issues that we will have to contend with as a movement.
So how do you intend to tackle these existential problems facing Nigerian workers? What are your short term and long term programmes? In other words, what are you bringing to the NLC leadership table?
In the NLC, like I said earlier, we don’t run any personal programmes. Contesting for the presidency of NLC, I don’t have personal programmes per se, so that when I get there, I champion those programmes. No, that is not how it works. Our programme is the people’s programme. Everything that we do must be centred on the workers – their welfare, wages, and conditions of service. If we are planning to do something else and a worker is sacked somewhere unjustly, then our attention shifts automatically to his plight.
But there are basic things. Like I was saying, if we want to be futuristic, I said Paschal Bafyau had this investment profile, this person had this political profile, the other person is a profile in courage, and yet the other had programmes with mass appeal. Now, in the first instance, we are going to take the issue of the welfare of the workers seriously. We have to fight to make sure that the issue of casualization is reduced to the barest minimum if not completely eliminated.
Nigerian workers have been reduced below even slaves through contract and casual employment. Some Nigerian workers earn as little as N15,000 with no conditions of service, no Medicare, no pension, nothing. So, all those things we are going to face them squarely.
Now, most employers refuse unionisation. They don’t allow workers to belong to unions. It is only when you belong to a union that your interest and welfare will be catered for. All those issues we will tackle. Some of the unions are almost at the point of extinction because of workplace tyranny by these employers. We have to put a stop to it. If we do that and empower the unions, make them strong and vibrant, then they will be in a position to serve their members. If you watch, most of the unions can do their fight. Some other unions cannot and that is where the NLC as an umbrella organisation steps in.
When people go on strike, it is at the level of unions. But there are unions that have to be mobilised to go on strike. We have to strengthen them to be able to even pick their own bills, take care of the welfare of their members and if we do that, we must have achieved a lot for the next generation of Nigerian workers.
Do you see NLC under your watch calling out Nigerian workers on the streets as it was the case in the past?
Well, it is situational. Dynamics and trends change. Some people work under environments that choke them. If you are working in such environments, that will determine your response. That is clear. If you are working in an environment where all is well, and you have a listening government, then the frequency of even calling people out for anything will be reduced.
We don’t call people out for the fun of it. It must be issue-driven. So, the issues will determine what course of action to take in every given circumstance. If not for the fact that Nigeria is going into elections now, the very day I was elected, we could have taken immediate action on the issue of fuel scarcity, CBN redesign policy and cash swap which has led to the apex bank collecting our money and not giving it back to us.
Some of these issues would have prompted immediate action. But you can now see that if you take any action between this week and next week, you are playing into the script of some fifth columnists who will use that excuse to postpone the elections. So, you have to equally time and monitor the situation, gauge the mood of the moment before you take certain actions. So, these are some of the factors that we consider before we take some actions.
But even when the NLC is not taking any immediate action on these issues, what is your position on the CBN Naira redesign policy?
Well, whatever might be the intention of those who formulated the policy, my concern and that of the NLC is for the money to be made available. I don’t want to go into the political dimensions of the policy. I wouldn’t know what motivated it but it is for the money to be available. If you say everybody should go and deposit what you have in the banks, because you are changing the colour of the Naira, and assuming that all I have is N20,000, and I have deposited it in a bank with the intention of collecting my N20,000 again in the new currency, If I pay in and can’t withdraw, it is like you want me to die of hunger.
To the average worker who I represent, that is our concern. If the policy is going to check inflation, fine, if it is going to checkmate vote buying and rigging of elections as some people are saying, well and good, who wants the election to be rigged? None of us wants the election to be rigged. All of us want free, fair and credible elections where the will of the people will prevail. So, if the policy will curtail the monetisation of the elections, fine. But if you say, come and change your money, then the new currency should be made available. That is my concern. That is our concern at the NLC.
Some people are saying that the firebrand Joe Ajaero that they used to know in the early stages of his stewardship as the General Secretary of the NUEE is no longer the Ajaero that has been elected NLC President. The fire is no longer there. Under your watch, government increased electricity tariffs almost every quarter without a whimper from you unlike before. What happened? Were you bought over or simply cowed by the powers-that-be?
Well, we have a docile populace. Nigerians are so docile. I don’t know how else to describe them. Nigerians want a Joe Ajaero to, even when they are fighting with their wives, come and separate them. For ten years, the National Union of Electricity Employees under my watch fought against privatisation as a policy. And in doing that, we informed every Nigerian unless those that were not born then that these are the implications – increase in tariffs, loss of jobs, etc. and some Nigerians came out to tell us that we are corrupt, NEPA is inefficient, it is because we don’t want to lose our jobs, they fought us.
And they were there when the Federal Government of Nigeria used Nigerian soldiers to privatise. All NEPA installations were taken over by soldiers and they privatised the electricity sector. And while they were doing that about ten or 12 years ago, I made a comment that Nigerians will speak last. Nigerians are speaking last now.
I have never seen such a docile society that you will wake up and your tariff jumps up and you will keep quiet and start looking for Joe Ajaero. Ordinarily, the unions don’t fight their management on policies that will bring more revenue for their members. If I was not brought up with some of my colleagues to see our union as a pan-Nigeria organisation, we won’t talk about tariff. Each time they increase tariff, we ask for salary increase because they will make money.
It has never happened in this country for a sectorial union to be criticising policies that will bring money to the organisation. If the price of beer, for instance, is increased now, Nigerian breweries workers will not say why will they increase it. Never! It has never happened anywhere, anytime. It is just because we took this pan-Nigerian orientation and we were criticising what was happening, and each time we criticise, Nigerians kept quiet and it appeared we were the trouble makers, and they were happy enjoying the tariff increases.
And at the same time, the people who are increasing your tariff, the Federal Government is equally giving them subvention running into trillions of Naira. And no Nigerian is talking. You sold NEPA at N400 billion and then you have given the people that bought it N2 trillion to do what?
And yet, Nigerians are keeping quiet. So, let them continue to keep quiet. But we won’t fail to point out all those issues to them. It is now left for them to decide to pay or not. So, if they decide to pay another N2,000 increase in tariff, that is their business, it is not a union business.
The Labour Party is a child of the NLC. So, what is the position of the Congress on the political fortunes of the LP and candidacy of Peter Obi? What is the relationship between the NLC and Labour Party?
Very cordial relationship in the sense that in my office now, I have the certificate of the Labour Party. The NLc through the workers’ sweat was able to register a party because it got to a stage where we were thinking of political power instead of every time protesting and being teargassed. And we said there is need to provide an alternative. We now started thinking about the nature of that political alternative. So, when the present political dispensation debuted, we started and were able to register a political party then called Party for Social Democracy. We didn’t come to register it as Labour Party because of the interest of the Nigerian state then. They wouldn’t have registered it. So, we disguised and registered the Party for Social Democracy. Thereafter we had our convention that changed the name and transformed to Labour Party.
Now, with that Labour Party in place, we started thinking of how to position it. We had some challenges that led to myriad of litigations. And early 2022, we were able through a consent judgement, facilitated by Femi Falana (SAN), who is our lawyer, to put the party back on its footing. And at the convention in Asaba, Delta State, Peter Obi emerged as the presidential candidate of the Labour Party. And since then, the party has been campaigning, going from one place to the other, increasing from what you used to know in terms on consciousness and mobilisation of most other Nigerians, not necessarily the workers alone.
So, that is where we are now. And what is happening is a plus to all of us. That is our relationship with them.
As the NLC president, are you endorsing the candidacy of Peter Obi, the candidate of your party, as the next president of Nigeria?
`The NLC NEC meeting has done that. I have to work with what is in existence. The National Executive Council of the NLC is the highest decision making organ of the NLC. In-between delegate conferences, now that we have had our delegate conference last week, it will take another four years to have another one. In-between that period, the NEC will now be taking the decisions and they took that decision, adopting Peter Obi. Of course, it is difficult for them to have another option if they are the owners of the party. So, that is exactly what has happened.
Will the leadership of the NLC join Mr. Peter Obi on the hustings or publicly canvass votes for the Labour Party?
Well, it is one thing being political and another canvassing votes as you are putting it. Is the leadership of the NLC running for political offices? We have provided a platform for Nigerians to run for offices. Now, I am not contesting for governorship, Senate or even presidency. But we are saying, this is our party. Some people are already running on the platform of the party. Now, there is no way I will juxtapose my position as the president of the Nigeria Labour Congress and that of the Presidential candidate of the Labour Party. Everybody has a role to play. This is our party and we are working for it to succeed. But to now transform to be governorship candidate, or whatever, it will be too much for the candidate to bear. There is a thin line between the NLC and Labour Party. Labour Party has to do its job as people canvassing to be voted for.
And it is not only the Labour people. Nigerians are involved. Artisans, civil servants, people are even decamping from other political parties to join the Labour Party. So, everything that the NLC needs to do, it has done as at today and we will continue to do whatever is required of us. But don’t forget that there are equally members of the NLC who are members of other political parties and that is why we must respect that provision of the Constitution that every Nigerian has the right join any political party of his choice.
So, while it is true that the NLC has the Labour Party as its political party, that does not stop any member from identifying with any political party other than Labour Party.
Do you have any fears for the upcoming elections?
Not quite because it is our belief that if there is a level-playing ground, this election will come and go, people will accept the result, there will be winners and losers. But if anything happens to the contrary, people may react and resist it. And the NLC, under our watch, will not keep quiet in the face of any electoral malpractice. We will not keep quiet in the face of people winning election and they are not declared winners. We will not keep quiet while rigging becomes the order of the day. The NLC will show more than a passing interest. We want to know how the elections are conducted, how things are done and we want to ensure that things are done well. That is exactly what will happen.
That is why your last question as to role of the NLC in the campaigns of the Labour Party was not directly responded to. Anybody that emerges from any political party will work with us and anyone that does anything that is not in order, will receive our stern rebuke. That is the way it is. But NLC is more than interested in this election to make sure that the election is not rigged, that there is no mago-mago.
What assurances are you giving Nigerian workers?
I am assuring them that I will be their voice. We will cry their cry. We will carry their burden. We will identify with them. I am assuring them that if there is any way we have lost contact with the people, we are reconnecting with them. And we expect the same thing from the people. We expect that they will reciprocate. It is not always that we will be on the streets but if there is need for it, we will be on the streets and we are ready to pay the price, no matter how high, to make sure that Nigeria gets better. That’s my assurance.