Strike: Kogi labour leaders allege threat to lives

The leadership of the organized labour in Kogi State has raised alarm over alleged threats to their lives for calling out workers for an indefinite strike action over unpaid salaries and other demands.

A statement issued yesterday in Lokoja by secretaries of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Olakunle Faniyi, Trade Union Congress, Comrade Kolawole James and their Joint Public Services Negotiating Council counterpart, Comrade Isah Abubakar, alleged that agents of the state government made up of armed thugs and some security agents had been on their trail since the declaration of the industrial action.

“The missions of these agents are either to maim or cause bodily harm on the leaders for their role in the successful strike action that has brought government business to a halt throughout the State,” the labour leaders said, calling on the state Commissioner of Police and Director of State Security Services to take urgent steps to protect their members.

Reacting, the Director General on Media and Publicity to the Governor of Kogi State, Mr Kingsley Fanwo described the allegations of labour against government as spurious.

“The statement was drafted in the language of their sponsors who have been attempting unsuccessfully to ring violence around the fingers of government.

Let it be placed on record that government has zero tolerance for violence,” Fanwo said.