Atiku Abubakar, former vice-president, says the President Bola Tinubu administration is the worst violator of workers’ rights in the nation’s history.
Abubakar said this in a statement issued on Wednesday to felicitate with Nigerian workers on the occasion of the International Workers’ Day.
Abubakar said despite improved working conditions of workers globally, the situation in Nigeria remains “dire”.
“As Nigerian workers join their counterparts across the world today to celebrate International Workers Day, it is a sobering truth that the plight of the Nigerian worker remains dire,” the statement reads.
The former vice-president said the “prolonged pledges and flowery words” by the government to increase the minimum wage “remains a mirage”.
“Every dawn unveils renewed hardships and harsh living conditions,” Abubakar said.
“The continued increase in tariffs in different service offerings without addressing the corruption and inefficiencies in the system only amounts to long-suffering Nigerians subsidising the corruption and inefficiencies in the system.
“Since the days of legendary Pa Michael Imoudu, to later day firebrands such as Pascal Bafyau and Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, the Nigerian worker has been at the forefront of the fight against tyranny and bad governance.
“No administration in our history has trampled on workers’ rights like this one. Daily, workers face uncertainty over skyrocketing prices of essential goods.
“The Nigerian worker has had it so rough under this current administration and it is unfortunate that while the living conditions of the Nigerian worker remain at a miserably low ebb, the Nigerian government continues to regale its international audiences with tales of how the masses are being weaned of their wasteful dependence on government.
“It is thus beginning to appear, that as far as the current federal government is concerned, the management of our country’s micro-economic outlook is an unwieldy laboratory experiment, to which the Nigerian worker is laid prostrate.”
Abubakar sympathised with Nigerian workers, saying the current administration has “ridiculed” them “for far too long”.
Abubakar said he hopes that the theme of this year’s Workers’ Day, which is ‘Ensuring Safety and Health at Work In a Changing Climate’, will inspire the federal government to put the concerns of workers on the front burner.
‘NIGERIAN WORKERS SUBJECTED TO ECONOMIC HARDSHIP’
Similarly, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has asked workers to be resilient and resist all “anti-people tendencies that seek to compromise and undermine the democratic tenets” of freedom, rule of law, accountability and probity in the country.
In a statement, Debo Ologunagba, PDP spokesperson, said workers should remain steadfast despite the “asphyxiating and life-discounting conditions” they face.
“Our Party is deeply distraught that Nigerian workers and indeed millions of other citizens have, in the last nine years been subjected to misery, harrowing economic hardship and worsening insecurity,” the statement reads.
The PDP urged the federal government to review all “retrogressive policies” that do not benefit workers.
“The PDP however urges Nigerian workers and indeed all citizens not to give up hope but remain steadfast in their commitment towards a stable, united and prosperous nation, especially at this challenging time,” Ologunagba said.
On Tuesday, the federal government approved an increase of between 25 percent and 35 percent in salaries for civil servants on the six consolidated salary structures.
The six consolidated salary structures are consolidated public service salary structure (CONPSS); consolidated research and allied institutions salary structure (CONRAISS); consolidated police salary structure (CONPOSS); consolidated para-military salary structure (CONPASS); consolidated intelligence community salary structure (CONICCS); and consolidated armed forces salary structure (CONAFSS).