Minister of labour and employment, Chris Ngige has explained why the federal government delayed its meeting with the Judicial Staff Union of Nigeria (JUSUN), and the Parliamentary Staff Association of Nigeria (PASAN).
Recall that after the unions went on strike, the government had initially fixed a meeting with the unionists for April 15, but it was rescheduled to April 20.
However, representatives of the union walked out of the meeting which was scheduled to hold by 3pm at the conference hall of the federal ministry of labour and employment.
Jimoh Alonge, JUSUN treasurer, stated that the Minister kept them waiting for close to two hours without any explanation.
Reacting to the situation, Ngige told journalists that members of the unions were impatient.
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He expressed that it was necessary to postpone the meeting to enable the government’s negotiating team to harmonise all issues from the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) reached at separate meetings with stakeholders.
“There is no point rushing to have a meeting that will be fruitless,” he said.
“The judiciary, the governors’ forum, and even the presidency are involved in this negotiation because the meeting held yesterday was at the office of the chief of staff to the president.
“The arising documents are not yet properly harmonised. It will, therefore, not be fruitful to hold a negotiation where people speak from irreconcilable positions.
“It would not help us and it would not help the unions either. The reason is to ensure that the agreement reached at the end of our meeting here is put into action, with timeline for implementation.
“So if we do not have a paper that is ready to go, then there will be no point for the talk shop.”
