Afolabi Oyekunle.
Concerned Affliates of the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria, (TUC) say the purported election of the President of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) Comrade Festus Usifo as the new President General of the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC) can not stand as it contradicts all forms, rules and laws guiding the Delegates Congress.
Addressing newsmen on Wednesday at the ASSIBIFI office, in Ikeja, Chairman of the Affiliates Union, Emmanuel Jaja said the delegates congress of 19th July 2022 should be disregarded and called on members of the public, the Federal and State Governments , and all employers of Labour not to recognise the election, or have anything to do with the so called leadership of TUC pending the determination of the substantives issues in the court.
According to Jaja it is regrettable and disheartening that a Labour Centre like (TUC) could deliberately
desecrate the temple of justice by flagrantly disobeying its orders, recalling that the National Industrial Court on
Wednesday 6th July 2022 restrained TUC and its agents in the presence of TUC Lawyers and that of the PENGASAN from conducting the Delegates Conference of the Congress pending the determination of
the substantive issues.
The Court also magnanimously granted an
accelerated hearing to the matter.
Jaja wondered what was so in the matter that warranted TUC and PENGASAN to disobeyed the court orders.
According to him, the cross of the matter is the Trade Union Congress resolutions at its 11th Triennial National
Delegates Conference held in 2019 where the Conference unanimously agreed that FOBTOB should produce the National President of the Congress from 2019 to 2022 while ASSIBIFI should produce the
President of the Congress from 2022 to 2025 and thereafter the position of the Presidency shall be left open to any affiliate that wishes to contest the position of Presidency.
This decision was reached at various organs of the Centre, that is, from National Administrative Council (NAC), the Central Working Committee, (CWC) the National Executive council (NEC) and at the National Delegates Conference.(NDC)
The implementation of the resolutions commenced with FOBTOB which produced the President of the Congress as agreed in 2019 and by 2022 June he served out his tenure.
He said as per the resolution of the 2019 Delegates Conference, it is ASSIB1FI turn to produce the next President.
“Regrettably, the National Secretariat of the Congress on 28th February 2022 issued a notice on the
Congress WhatsApp platforms informing the Affliates of the coming Congress National Delegates conference which was scheduled to hold on Tuesday 19th and Wednesday 20th July 2022.
“The crux of our Court action was the inclusion of the position of the Presidency among the contestable positions. On noticing what we considered initially as a mistake turned out to be a deliberate and wilful intention to distort the congress unanimous agreement reached at the 2019 Delegates Conference, We the 10
Attiliates jointly wrote to the leadership of the Congress drawing their attention to the mistake and requested for its correction, but until the time of this press briefing no response was received from the President of the Congress.
ASSIBIFI on her part reminded the President of the Congress of the observed
mistake but no response nor excuse was received till date.
The only option left for this group was to seek the court interpretation of the Delegates Conference
resolutions and as a responsible organisation, the leadership of TUC should have waited to hear from
the Court rather than taken laws into their hands thereby defiling the Court orders.”
He said while their Lawyers were in Court in Lagos on Tuesday 19th July 2022, defending their position and imaginations, they were busy in Abuja desecrating the Court of competent jurisdiction.
“We are yet to understand the desperation by TUC leadership and PENGASAN in this regard to warrant a responsible centre llike ours to dam the consequences of disobeying Court orders to hold the so called election even earlier than scheduled.”
The Conference was fixed for Wednesday 20th July 2022 but was
held on Tuesday 19th July 2022.
According to him, There was no CWC and NEC meetings before the so called election, they just went straight to conduct what they called election and allocated 18 votes to ASSIBIFI. “WHAT AN
IMPETUS, IMPUNITY AND ARROGANCE”
In the light of the above, we therefore call on the Federal and State Governments and all Employers of Labour in Nigeria not to recognise or have anything to do with the so aclaimed leadership of Trade
Union Congress of Nigeria pending the determination of the substantive issues in Court.
Jaja said they had directed their lawyers to ensure that they do the needful as regards the violation of the Court orders to serve as a deterrant to others who may want to defile Court orders in future.
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