NUJ seals Daily Independent Abuja office to protest 23-month pay arrears

Nigerian Union of Journalists staged a sit-out outside the Abuja office of Daily Independent newspaper to protest the paper’s treatment of its journalists. On Thursday, members of the union in Abuja sealed the paper’s gates, NUJ said in a statement. It said Daily Independent owed its staff arrears of 23 months of pay. The paper’s […]

Nigerian Union of Journalists staged a sit-out outside the Abuja office of Daily Independent newspaper to protest the paper’s treatment of its journalists.

On Thursday, members of the union in Abuja sealed the paper’s gates, NUJ said in a statement.

It said Daily Independent owed its staff arrears of 23 months of pay.

The paper’s management, led by Ted Iwere, is also said to have “forcefully, unlawfully, unjustly and wrongfully demoted some of its staff,” NUJ council secretary Rafat Salami said in Abuja.

The paper’s management also “maliciously and gluttonously appropriated to itself, the financial contributions of its staff to the cooperative society.”

The protest comes after the union’s Lagos arm staged similar protest at th Lagos office of the paper.

The FCT council of the NUJ joins all other councils of the Union in calling for government intervention to compel the Ted Iwere-led management Daily Independent to pay our colleagues their dues immediately,” said Salami.

“The Union also calls on all media owners who owe our colleagues to immediately fulfil their contractual obligations to avert a picketing of their premises.”