The Nigeria Intervention Movement (NIM) has expressed shock over the statements and reactions of Kaduna State Governor, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, over the controversy that trailed his decision to sack 36,000 workers in the state, including 21,000 teachers.
They said that despite the widespread condemnation of the sack, the governor has remained adamant and that NIM backs the position of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), while condemning the action of the governor.
“The Nigeria Intervention Movement is appalled that the Kaduna State Government can contemplate sacking 36,000 of its workers in one fell swoop, given its ripple effect on the state economy and the teeming dependants of the sacked workers at a time the unemployment market is oversaturated with over four million workers losing their jobs in 2017 alone due to failing economy, according to the Nigeria Bureau of Statistics,” NIM, said.
In a statement signed by Head of Publicity Bureau, NIM, Mallam Naseer Kura, the movement expressed full support for the NLC on the commencement of a series of industrial actions which began with public protests and rallies on Thursday, January 11, 2018 in Kaduna State.
Mallam Kura said the NIM has also been briefed by the leadership of Labour that the Kaduna State Government insisted on sacking about 21,000 of its teachers alleged to have failed a controversial competency test in 2017.
He said: “Indeed the government had gone ahead to issue sack letters to the workers after allegedly pulling out of a conciliatory intervention by the Federal Ministry of Labour and even after NLC had obtained a restraining order against the Kaduna State Government from the National Industrial Court, a court constitutionally empowered to adjudicate on such matters.
“While NIM does not encourage the retention of incompetent teachers or workers for that matter, it discourages the mass sack of workers on trumped up excuses, particularly when a state government, itself a creation of law, decides to ignore with impunity the intervention of a competent court of jurisdiction. If not checked, this could entrench arbitrariness and induce anarchy in the polity.
“This is particularly more worrisome in the case of Kaduna State where virtually all the textile factories, about the only viable industry in that state, have since become moribund because both the Federal and state governments have failed to initiate a conducive environment for local businesses to thrive.
“In handling the alleged incompetence of teachers of Kaduna State, NIM recommends the governance solution model which some other states have employed with appreciable degrees of success. Faced with such critical decision imperatives in the recent past, states like Kwara, Ekiti, Sokoto opted to retrain and retool their teachers.
“Today, the fortunes of education in those states have improved significantly as evidenced in the performance of their pupils and students in National examinations such as WASC, NECO, JAMB.
“A novel managerial thinking is exemplified in the Sokoto State initiative where those totally found deficient in the profession of teaching are redeployed to other sectors of the state economy where their skill sets are best utilised.
“Except the mass sack in Kaduna State is dictated by some other undisclosed reasons, the above models can be appropriated to resolve the Kaduna State imbroglio.
“No matter what the Kaduna State Government decides to do in the circumstance, NIM cautions that the Kaduna State industrial controversy should not be allowed to fester and burgeon into a national industrial crisis at a precarious time like this.”