Nigeria to support best ILO DG candidate- Ngige

The Minister of Labour and Employment, Sen. Chris Ngige, has assured that Nigeria will support the best candidate for the post of the Director-General of the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

Ngige gave this assurance while receiving the Australian candidate for the post and incumbent Deputy Director-General of ILO, Mr Greg Vines, in his office on Thursday in Abuja.

Vines was accompanied by the Australian High Commissioner to Nigeria, Mr John Donnelly and the Secretary to the High Commission, Ms Annabelle Simpson.

Our correspondent reports that a new Director-General of ILO is expected to emerge through secret ballot at the 344th session of the Governing Board in March 22, 2022.

It was further reported that Nigeria has three votes in the governing board.

Ngige noted that from inception, ILO had made tremendous success in sustaining the world of work and therefore everything possible should be done to support, energise and re-energise the organisation, especially in the post COVID-19 pandemic era.

According to him, the pandemic had left the economy of many nations very debilitated, distorted the world of work and inflicted loss of income on the working group, particularly those in the informal sector.

“With that blow, the informal sector of the working group has been debilitated very badly. In Nigeria here, the people in the informal sector constitute about 60-70 per cent of workers and entrepreneurs in the working economy.”

“Therefore, what this means is that the ILO should look out for the best in choosing the next director-general.”

”I am happy that you pointed out that tripartism is working in Nigeria. I want to assure you that the tripartism is here and we are working and social dialoguing well in the spirit of decent work agenda.”

“Nigeria occupies a prime place in the Governing Board of ILO. We had to get back to the Governing Board in 2016 after 10 years exit.”

”What is spectacular about our return is that we came back in full force, ranging from the government side, the workers represented by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the employers’ federation, represented by the Nigeria Employers Consultative Association (NECA).”

“Even before we did this movement, recognising the role of Nigeria in the governing board, I headed the government group as the president for two years. So, it is a very big honour,” Ngige said.

Ngige, however, commended the Deputy Director-General, Mr Vines and the Director-General, Mr Guy Ryder, for superintending the election that gave Nigeria that elevation and assisting her to discharge the functions of that office creditably.

He described the visit of the Australian candidate to Nigeria as a step in the right direction, assuring that the country had no problem with his manifesto.

“The manifesto shows somebody who has deep knowledge of the workings of the ILO. So, on behalf of the Nigerian tripartite partners, I want to inform you that we have received your manifesto and we are going to consult further on it.”

“It is a manifesto that gives hope for the resurgence of the ILO, especially in this post-pandemic period. As a country, we are not oblivious of the fact that five candidates are going for this position, “he said.

He, therefore, noted that there are five countries competing for the position which include France, Korean, South African, Togolese and Australia

“We want to assure that as a country, we have decided that we will give our votes to the best candidate. We look forward to getting others sell their manifesto to us like you,” he said.

He prayed that other countries should toe the path chosen by Nigeria by voting for the best among the candidates aspiring for the plum job.

Earlier, Mr Vines assured that if elected, he would tackle the challenges facing the world of work including gender inequality, youth unemployment, child labour, employment insecurity, inadequate social protection, amongst others.

He said ILO needed a strong leadership to address these challenges, the reason his country was pushing him forward for the job.

Vines noted that he had a background spanning decades on labour matters working in government, trade union and ILO.

According to him, if elected, he would be seeing ILO from the eye of a constituent, being the deputy DG in the past nine years.

He pledged to pursue a strong relationship with the United Nations and World Bank in building capacity in labour administration and social protection.