 You're welcome back. NLC is spoiling for a fight, not just at the national level. We also have at, in Emo state, where the injunction that they should not go on strike has been extended by the court. And we have here to discuss with us this morning the Assistant General Secretary NLC, Mr. Chris Onyeka. Good morning and welcome to the program. Yeah, good morning. Thank you for having me. Okay, we'll start from the local scene, which is Emo state in this case, and then we'll go to the national. So let's begin. What's going on in Emo state? The Emo state, NLC was supposed to go on strike. Now the courts have said that they cannot go on strike. What's the situation? The situation is very clear. NLC would embark on action as we have proposed. The Emo state government had unfortunately become exterior as user of the rights and privileges of workers in the state. And unfortunately, this habit is led by a belief by the government that it has succeeded at initiating the workers and the trade union leaders in the state. And so the belief in this is misled itself into all-heel workers, salaries, most and most of salaries. Those dues that were deducted, the government refused to hand over to the unions that also check out dues. Personals were owed areas of their patience. Workers were declared good workers. And why they are still working for the government when declared good workers? Our secretariat of NLC was underlined by agents of the government. The government captured that way. Then, I think that is not enough. As we are trying to organize this year, the government sent its agents that did that to elect their own leadership, not leaders for government or for any other government, but people for NLC in the state. The work that was made for the union for the election that was supposed to recruit new leaders. I think that was not enough. As the workers were organizing this year's NLC as NLC secretariat equipment, wounded many people who ended up in hospital. One woman died as a consequence of the action, the violence that was meted against us. On that same day, the woman died the following day at the root of the shock, the trauma. This allegations are very weighty. How did you know it was the state governor? Was it the police that was sent or army or security outfits that are under the purview of the governor? How did you know he sent these talks? Yes, because the one that happened during the delegate conference was that the governor had his own candidates that he wanted to be the leader of the NLC in the state. And the people that came used the name of the governor. They said he had his banished the Congress. Now the first people that said during that were thoughts, when they had beaten up the people and we invented the system, then the police now say that they have authority not to allow this Congress to take place. That happened during the mandate. It will interest you to know that those some policemen came and told the leaders in the NLC that they had been ordered to beat up everybody. Even the workers that beat themselves, we have the proper decision of accommodations and conventions. We have compared these entities and sent it to these bodies to show you how dangerous it is. Interesting, but now that you say the action will still continue, you've been told that there will be consequences. How do you intend to navigate around that? We don't know about consequences. We don't know about consequences. All we know is that protected. If any judge is hitting anywhere and believing that justice so well now or whether he believes that he can stay somewhere and the issue gets to work as he demonstrates. That becomes not our constitution, guarantees to NLC TV, the rise of history assemble and to all opinion that must have given an injunction. Now this case has been adjourned till November 3 for hearing whether there was going to be a settlement or otherwise. Are you prepared to wait till November 3? It's just two days away from the first of November that was supposed to be the day for the strike if I'm not mistaken. Are you prepared to wait for the extra two days? The National Liberal Congress believes in social dialogue and calls it bargaining and that has always been our center point. It is the government of him or state that has advocated this responsibility. Instead of dialogue, it would decide to use violence. This is a dialogue game. It would decide to go to court and to procure judgments in the midnight against each young worker. But that is not going to work. We are hoping for discussion. But it is not a kind of discussion that has taken place between us and them. Because the initial time that we discussed with them, we reached agreement. At the end of the day, we reached agreement. That is where we are. The problem is agreement has been reached. But if the agreement is asking for the move, we stand down with you. We reached agreement. Why can't we implement these agreements? That is the problem. Okay, finally now. Okay, just to be clear, this strike will still go on, right, in a more state. I am already in a more state. I came into a more state yesterday and this action will go on. Whether this action will go on, because I am a free citizen of Nigeria, we will organize ourselves, come together. If they want to jail us, let them jail us. If they want to shoot us, let them shoot us. But we will liberate the workers of him or state. And we are determined about that. It is as simple as that. The choice is in the hands of the government of him or state. The government of him or state can decide to implement the agreements, can decide to meet with us. We will discuss people and we will call it off. But if they refuse, we are here. And the action is bound to take place. It is as simple as that. Let's go to the national scene. The national NLC is threatening that today, the meeting that is supposed to hold between the labor and the federal government, they may boycott it if the minister of labor attends the meeting. And we don't really know what is going on there, because how do you talk about labor issues without the minister of labor being in attendance? What really are the issues that need to be addressed, that can be addressed without the minister of labor being there? What's the situation at the national scene now? The minister of labor is supposed to be the constituted authority. As far as industrial relations issues are concerned in Nigeria. And now he's supposed to be an editor, the mediator. Which means that he's supposed to be neutral. That is the moral high ground that is acquired of anybody that is holding that particular position. The position of the minister of labor and that of the general of the federation are two political positions in Nigeria that require the occupants of such position in such a way that is on the earth, in such a way that protects the nation at all times, all like other ministers. But unfortunately, this minister, this minister had decided to descend into the arena, he descended into the arena in an issue, industrial relations issue, which means that you have lost the moral high ground to continue as an editor. You have stripped yourself and that is what has happened to the minister of labor. We no longer have trust and confidence in his position at the minister of labor to continue to sit at table with us to discuss these matters because we have lost confidence. And these kind of negotiations require that we have people that are already dispassionately to save Nigeria through relations crime. What is the minister doing? In the case of the national union of road transport workers, you remember some group of people from Lagos to go and occupy us of the union. They chased out the democratically elected leaders and imposed a group of people, that's of the union, even led to the death of one person, as with the police authorities, with the resolve and the way we had talked about it, was to call a leg of negotiating, went and hold a liquid that came from Lagos and organized delegated people. We have seen that in Lagos, they had held all these conferences, which culminated, culminated between Barua and Nassarawa state. What in private, if you go and organize your own conference, Mr. Onieka, is supposed to protect the industrial relations client, is the one that is trying to pollute it. So we are saying to avoid this solution, to avoid this contamination, if you stay away or if you put yourself on that particular idea, that you can take sides in issues like this. We now understand why you took that position, but we do hope that the outcome of this meeting, or the meeting will hold in the first place, and then the outcome of this meeting will be for the good of Nigerians. We wish to lock in Emo state and at the national level as you fight this fight for the common man. Thank you so much. Thank you so much and congratulations for having me. Thank you for being a part of our program. We were talking with Mr. Chris Onieka, the assistant general secretary of NLC. He spoke to us from Emo state, where he has gone to mobilize the others to either dialogue with the government, or embark on the industrial action and damp the consequences according to the courts. Well, that's how we will wrap up on the show this morning. It's been a pleasure being here to serve you. We do hope that we are going to do it again sometime tomorrow. Stay with us. Up next is the news. My name is Nyam Gul Aghaji.