Crisis over the registration of the two newly registered university-based unions, the Congress of Nigerian University Academics and the National Association of Medical and Dental Lecturers in Academics, has deepened as the Nigerian Labour Congress insisted that the Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, erred by registering the two unions.
The NLC also asked Ngige to reveal his true reason for registering the two unions.
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This is just as the labour union insisted that the minister was not properly advised on the matter
It was earlier reported that the NLC wrote a letter to Ngige requesting him to withdraw the registration certificates of CONUA and NAMDA.
Ngige, in his response, asked the NLC to “refrain from misinforming the public.”
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In a fresh twist, the NLC, in another letter signed by its President, Ayuba Wabba, and addressed to Ngige, a copy of which was obtained by our correspondent on Thursday, asked the minister to state his motive for registering the new unions.
The letter read in part:
Overall, we still want to believe that you were not properly advised on this matter. As the Chief Labour Law Officer of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, we believe that you will take advantage of our presentation of the true position of the law to redress this grave injustice done to our labour jurisprudence by the ‘awarding’ of trade union certificates to CONUA and NAMDA.
The truth is that the minister cannot claim more knowledge than experts in this field, particularly Justices of the National Industrial Court, Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court of Nigeria and all your predecessors in office, of which three are very senior lawyers (Adetokunbo Kayode, SAN), Dr Hassan Lawal, PhD, and Barrister Emeka Nwogu).
All these respected the provisions of the Labour Act, which also guided their actions while in office.
