Ogun welders, fitters picket coy over local content law

Members of the Nigerian Welders and Fitters Union (NIWELFU), Ogun State chapter, yesterday staged a protest against Interfact Beverages, located along the Sagamu-Siun road in the Obafemi Owode Local Government Area of Ogun State, over the alleged inability of the company to obey the local content policy.  During the protest, which began as early as […]

Members of the Nigerian Welders and Fitters Union (NIWELFU), Ogun State chapter, yesterday staged a protest against Interfact Beverages, located along the Sagamu-Siun road in the Obafemi Owode Local Government Area of Ogun State, over the alleged inability of the company to obey the local content policy.

 During the protest, which began as early as 6:00a.m, hundreds of members barricaded the company’s main gate. The development temporarily halted traffic on the ever-busy road for several hours.

 The state chairman of the union, Comrade Ganiyu Lawal, who addressed the protesters, said the body could no longer tolerate the attitude of the company in bringing “outsiders” into the company against local professionals he maintained were equally competent to carry out the required activities.

 “We have written to the appropriate quarters, including the state Commissioner for Commerce and Industry and the Nigeria Labour Congress, yet they have decided to turn deaf ears to our agitations,” Lawal said.

 He insisted that production companies in Nigeria must obey the local content law. “Even in South Africa, you cannot flout the law on local content. If that cannot be done in South Africa, we cannot allow it here as well,” he said.

 NIWELFU’s Public Relations Officer, Comr. Ola Atinsola-Jamiu, said the union had been very patient with Interfact Beverages on the local content issue before taking the decision to embark on the protest.

 “We have been patient with the company, but they seemed to be taking our patience for granted, particularly when one South African identified as G1 vowed that the company’s policy cannot be changed.

 “We have to show that we are not a dormant union. We are active. If that is the message they understand, we are here to show that,” Atinsola-Jamiu said.

 The protest, which the Lagos State chapter chairman of NIWELFU, Comr. Tunde Ajide, also attended, saw the company’s management calling for a truce as operations were crippled.

 Effort by our correspondent to get the reaction of the company’s managers was futile, as its Security Manager said the directors, none of who he said was around at that moment, had not authorised any manager to talk to the media. “But you can go to our headquarters in Lagos if you want any comment,” the security official said.