‘Nigerian Railway workers not against concession but…’

What’s the position of the workers to the proposed concession of railway? As regards the bidding process that brought the GE (General Electric), we want to tell you most authoritatively that we don’t know of any bidding process that actually produced GE. So, how GE came on board would be better explained by the Federal […]

What’s the position of the workers to the proposed concession of railway?
As regards the bidding process that brought the GE (General Electric), we want to tell you most authoritatively that we don’t know of any bidding process that actually produced GE. So, how GE came on board would be better explained by the Federal Government. We feel that in a critical situation like this, it is very important to harness the involvement of all stakeholders particularly the union, the representatives of the workers. As far as we are concerned, we are not aware of any process that actually produced the GE and that’s why we are saying clearly that we are not in any way against concession of railway if that is what the Federal Government believes will turn round the fortunes of the railway system that has not actually been up to the expected standard we want it to be. But our experience as Nigerians with past privatizations, concessions, name it, gives us enough ground and rationality to exercise some fears that this thing (Nigerian Railway concession) may go the usual way of the past experience we have had in some other government owned institutions.
The fact of the matter is that we are not in any way against it but what makes us to now have an issue with the government is if at the end of the day our demands and prayers are not heard and respected. Our prayers are: we don’t want any seamless transfer of our members, the Nigerian Railway workers, into the hands of another owner of railway through the instrumentality of concessioning. So, what we are saying is, we have started as public servants, we want to end it as public servants. Get us our severance benefits and let us go. And if the third party owner of railway at that point in time now takes interest to continue with the railway business, he can as well go to labour market and recruit employable Nigerian youths to get into the business. But we are majorly concerned about all our rights, all that should accrue to Nigerian railway workers should not be denied us, that is just the only thing that can stand us in between being party and collaborator of bringing about a due diligent concession of Nigerian Railway with a view to really taking Nigerian railway service to a higher pedestal where it will avail Nigerians commuting public very true effective and efficient rail transport services. This is our stand and nothing else.

What if the Federal Government refuses to hearken to your demands?
We are not praying for that. From the body language of the sitting administration, we want to reason that they would not want to get unnecessarily encumbered with trade disputes and labour related problems. They will want to settle and once that is done we would move forward from there. And in any unlikely possibility of denying us our rights, of course we won’t rest on our oars, we would continue to explore diverse methodologies to ensure that our rights, our benefits, what we are demanding which of course are clearly legitimate are given us until any concession of whatever shape is carried out.

So, are you saying that you are not ready for concession?
We have said it very clearly and emphatically we don’t want seamless transfer of our members to another party. We don’t want to run the risk of the unknown. We don’t want a situation where a concessionaire would come on board and probably having had arrangement with our present employers now transfer all of us to their payroll and midway they decide to wield everybody off. We don’t want to stand in the way of an effective and efficient railway system through concession. All we are saying is give us our benefits, we are not interested in going with GE of this world or any concessionaire.

How many of the workers are in this struggle?
The Nigerian Railway workers of today are about 10,000.

You talked about the staff quarters to be handed over to the workers by the railway management, what is the level of engagement with the government on this?
The monetization policy of 2003 that came to effect in 2005 under the regime of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo and right from that point we expect the sitting management of the Nigerian Railway Corporation to be very magnanimous enough to go ahead and implement as directed by the monetization policy of the federal government. But to our surprise they deliberately left that aspect of monetization of staff quarters which of course was supposed to be the beginning of the implementation of that policy, they went ahead to implement salary structure as known to that monetization policy which is consolidated salary regime which is where we are till this moment and now. When it now comes to the aspects of the policy which stipulates transfer of ownership of the quarters that are presently tenanted there, it became an issue. And we engaged the government for quite a number of years and because we believe in a dynamic and more acceptable way of doing things, we decided not to be banging table or going on the street causing disruption of peace. We went to court, National Industrial Court of Nigeria and we were in court for five years and after the five year legal battle, the judgement went in our favour. We came back with the document presented to the management and we expected them to implement it, but it appears they are not ready to implement the judgement.

What are the factors responsible for the inefficiency of our railway system?
The kind of railway we have is the type that the federal government, that is still the owner up to this moment should be busy equipping but the past governments particularly the military governments had chosen for reasons best known to them to neglect continued investment into Nigerian Railway. That is what was partly responsible for the comatose and almost moribund state of the Nigerian Railway. For God’s sake the Nigerian Railway workers do not have any power to improve on the facilities with which Nigerian Railways will generate very good and dependable rail transport services to the commuting public and this is why it is going to be unfair for anybody to be blaming the Nigerian Railway workers for the present situation and inadequacies of the Nigerian Railway. Nigeria Railway is exactly the kind of Nigerian Railway that the Nigerian state can afford to give the Nigerian people and that’s why we cannot have this kind of Nigerian Railway in American space, in French space, in other climes where they are doing the right thing.