By Correspondent in Lokoja.
The Management of the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC) has assumed crucial meeting to arrest the indefinite strike embarked upon by members of National Union of Electricity Employee( NUEE) within the Abuja franchise of the company.
The Reporters gathered members of the union took the decision,to press home their demands for Improve welfare package.
The Kogi State Chairman of NUEE,Comr. Segun Medupin, disclosed this while speaking with our Correspondent in a telephone interview in Lokoja on Monday on the strike.
“Our Council joined the strike with our sister councils within the Abuja franchise of the company,but our management at the headquarters in Abuja have gone into crucial meeting, with a view to resolving the issues to led to the strike,” he said.
The Reporters gathered that other councils that joined the strike within the the Abuja franchise are: Niger, Nasarawaand FCT with effect from 12 midnight on Monday.
The issues at stakes according to Comr. Segun Medupin in a statement, include non payment of entitlements such as :
Thrift Deductions – 8 months,
Pension Remittances – 20 months, Remaining Batches 2020 productivity Bonus.
Others are:3rd batch of Bulk Rent to all the workers of AEDC and Electricity Workers in Nigeria and non release of intervention funds by CBN to AEDC as it has been released to other DISCOS. CBN escrow AEDC accounts.
In Minna, Niger state capital,our Correspondent reports that customers who went to recharge or for different complaints were driven away by the protesting staff who were out early Monday morning to lock up the entire company premises in parts of the metropolis and across the states.
The workers, some carrying placards with different inscriptions, besieged the regional office with the gates under lock and key and vowed that the region would remain in darkness “as the strike is indefinite”, until the AEDC listens to their demands which include; providing them with tools/components to reduce risks of professional hazards and customers harrassments.
At the AEDC Regional headquarters, located beside U K Bello Arts theatre, Minna, the Vice Chairman of NUEE/spokesperson of the union for the region, Comrade Mua’zu Ibrahim, lamented the harsh working condition members of the union were subjected to by the AEDC.
According to him, “The strike would be indefinite and until all the remittances and deductions from salaries for the past 20 months are paid and/or remitted to our various pesion service providers, members will not resume work”.
Comrade Mu’azu further alleged that, “For over eight years, no staff has been promoted and none had benefited from anything like annual salary increment. What we see is a kind of clandestine discriminate treatment or some sorty of inequality in the payment of salaries”.
“Monies are being deducted from our salaries but not remitted to the pension company, bulk rent that was deducted not paid to us, also the cooperative which is being done by staff have not been paid for over seven months now yet they are still deducting from our salaries and the productivity bonus for senior staff has not been paid since last year”.
“We have been working without adequate working tools or materials notwithstanding the risks involved. We are tired of explaining to customesr why they need to provide this or that in order to have light in their homes when in real sense it is our responsibility to provide such things for them,” he said.
According to him, members are not happy over the monthly deductions from salaries in the name of retirement benefits without remitting same to the various individual pension companies, ‘Bulk Rent’ defaulting and as well, Cooperative Society deductions not properly accounted for by the AEDC, adding that such anomalies must stop.
Also speaking, the NUEE National Women Committee leader in the zone, Comrade Zainab Gaku,said members of the union could no longer continue working, considering the inherent risk, hence the need for the indefinite strike until the AEDC management do the needful.
NUEE members, according to Zaymab are “asking for better condition or service, proper accounting of deductions from their salaries and other benefits which should have been remitted accordingly but has not been done”.
Series of dialogue with the management, on the number of issues raised by the NUEE failed to yield desired results and this according to Comrade Zaynab prompted the picketing of the AEDC as the only option to fight for their rights to better condition of service.
Zaynab said that all possible peaceful resolution of matter failed adding,“that is why we surprised them today. We took them unawares. They were not aware that we are embarking on this protest in demand for more favourable condition of service.We have been pushed to the wall and we are not going back on this indefinite until our demands are met,”she said.
Our Correspondent in Lokoja, noted the return of electricity to Gadumo, Ganaja and some other parts of the town at about 9 p.m on Monday, a developmnt some observers believe could mean that the union might have either called off or suspended its strike.
Edited by Dada Ahmed.
