Strike: Meeting with Labour fruitful — Lalong

Mr Simon Lalong, Minister of Labour and Employment, has said that the meeting between the Federal government and organised labour over the ongoing nationwide strike was fruitful.

Lalong said this while speaking with newsmen at the end of a closed-door meeting at the office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) on Wednesday in Abuja.

It would be recalled that organised labour, on Nov. 13, directed all its affiliates to embark on an indefinite nationwide strike.

The strike was called to press home their demands, including the “non action by the Federal Government over the attack on the NLC President, Joe Ajaero in Imo state”.

Lalong said that there was hope and that he does not expect the industrial action to last long.

“The meeting was held especially in respect to what happened in Imo, with all the labour leaders present and we had a very, very fruitful discussion.

“The discussion was very genuine and very frank which they have agreed to take back to their constituency. There was a plea to stop the strike so that we can continue in out deliberation.

“No commitment yet but it is an ongoing discussion, and we don’t expect the strike to go on for long,” he said.

Speaking, Mr Festus Osifo, President of the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC), said they had a robust conversation.

According to him, a lot of assurances were given in furtherance to the release that was made by the National Security Adviser (NSA) this morning.

Osifo said that the NSA indicated that “Some people involved in the attack have been apprehended and further investigations are on.

“But at the end of the day, they made several appeals to us and several promises on what they are going to do and the once they have done currently.

“We said we will go back and re-appraise all the conversations we had and then we will communicate accordingly.

“So, every discussion we have had here, we need to take it back, examine it and take a decision,” Osifo said.

At the time of filing in this report, the NLC and TUC are having joint National Executive Council (NEC) to decide on the ongoing strike.