OYO STATE MINIMUM WAGE STRUGGLE: AN IMPRESSIVE DISPLAY OF WORKERS POWER!
OYO STATE MINIMUM WAGE STRUGGLE: AN IMPRESSIVE DISPLAY OF WORKERS POWER!
By Biodun Bamgboye
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Abbey Trotsky addressing striking workers in Ibadan, Oyo state – photo DSM |
It was in Oyo state that the struggle for the implementation of the N18,000 minimum recorded the first impressive display of workers’ power. But in an unfortunate twist the workers eventually got a rotten deal forced down their throat by the compromising state Labour leaders.
The workers had however tried to avert this development. At a Congress held on Friday July 8, 2011, they did not only roundly reject N9,500 “relativity pay” but also stoned the Labour leaders and passed a vote of no confidence on them for their seeming complicity in the rotten offer by the Abiola Ajimobi – led ACN state government. The workers went further to constitute a seven-man “Congress Committee” to coordinate actions on the minimum wage struggle after the state NLC leadership refused to show up at subsequent Congresses to update the workers on the negotiations with the government. Abbey Trotsky, the Oyo state coordinator of DSM, was also elected as a member of this committee.
The workers held about three Congresses independently of the leadership. While they were constrained by the limitations of the Congress Committee, who, though well-meaning and committed, did not want to rock the boat apparently for the fear of repressive measures from the state, the workers were still able to produce a leaflet, financed from a fighting fund collected at the Congress, to mobilize mass support for their action. This leaflet was mass circulated at the government offices in Ibadan, the state capital. The initiative for raising this fighting fund and the production of the leaflet was originally suggested by DSM comrades and supported overwhelmingly by the workers. While our proposals for mass rallies and setting up of strike committees at the local government attracted mass support, the committee lacked the will to implement them.
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Abbey Trotsky addressing striking workers in Ibadan, Oyo state – photo DSM |
Apparently in an attempt to take over the initiative and direction of the struggle from the ordinary workers who were rapidly becoming radicalized, the state NLC leadership later showed up at a congress to give the report of the negotiations with the government. In order to reclaim the lost confidence of workers in their commitment to the struggle, the Labour leaders declared an indefinite strike a few days before the planned July 20 commencement of the botched three-day nation warning strike. Of course this struck the right cord with the workers who had agitated for actions to force the recalcitrant government to implement the minimum wage. Despite all this verbal heroic display, the state leadership in their characteristic bureaucratic and compromising manner went ahead to sign an agreement for a N13,500 minimum wage with the government without coming to a Congress to subject the agreement to the democratic decision of the rank and file workers. The workers accepted this rotten offer, having apparently become weary of the struggle that had become isolated by the lack of coordinated activities at the national level.
Following the N13,500 agreement, many workers who had had confidence that the struggle would force the recalcitrant government to succumb to the demand for unconditional implementation of N18,000 minimum wage naturally became demoralized. This was to the extent that some of them began to question the justification for the whole struggle in the first place. This is one of the unfortunate havocs the compromising trade union leadership has consistently wrecked in the labour movement. We however call on the workers not to despair; there is no alternative to struggle. It would have been much worse but for their spirited struggle which moderated the recklessness of the labour leaders. The fact that Ajimobi-led government who at many occasions insisted that his government could not pay more than N9,400 as minimum wage was forced by the radicalization of mass of Oyo workers to sign N13,500 minimum wage clearly shows that struggle pays. Indeed, with a committed and uncompromising leadership a better concession or outright victory would have been possible.
The workers should continue to agitate for the implementation of the minimum wage without retrenchment and call on the trade union leaders to issue a fresh ultimatum for full implementation or the calling of another strike with various mass activities. At the same time steps must be taken to transform Labour into a fighting movement, compromising leaders must be replaced by class struggle activists who are not in the pocket of capitalist politicians. The election of the “Congress Committee” was an excellent example of how the rank and file can begin to take control over their own movement, and now the conclusion needs to drawn that the existing Oyo state NLC leadership has to be replaced by one that seriously fights for its members.
Alongside this, it is important for the working masses to appreciate the fact that, as long as the self-serving, profit-first capitalist system prevails, even the N18,000 minimum wage will not offer a permanent relief to the unmitigated socio-economic crisis that daily confronts them especially in the face of increasing high cost of living and services occasioned by the anti-poor neo-liberal policies of privatization, deregulation, etc. Therefore, the struggle for minimum wage and other concessions must be linked with the struggle for the overthrow of the iniquitous capitalist system and its replacement with a socialist order. This is one of the reasons we have been calling on workers’ and labour leaders in particular to spearhead the formation of a fighting working peoples’ party armed with a socialist program. Such party should be built to be formidable enough to wrest political power from the thieving ruling capitalist elites at all levels and form a workers and poor government that is prepared to use the collective resources of the society of the benefits of the vast majority.
The need for such party has been further underscored by the refusal of the self-professed “progressive” Ajimobi/ACN – led administration, like his counterparts in ACN and other establishment political parties viz. PDP, APGA, CPC, ANPP and LP, to pay a paltry N18,000 minimum wage. Even in the states where N18,000 or more has been supposedly paid as the minimum wage only a minority of workers benefit. This has perfectly confirmed the position of DSM that none of the existing political parties across the country today is capable of guaranteeing a better living condition for the mass of working but suffering masses.
Members of DSM participated actively in the agitation and struggle of Oyo workers for minimum wage. We indeed played a key role in helping raise the consciousness of workers for the struggle. On the May Day we massively circulated a leaflet agitating for the minimum wage and sold all the copies of Socialist Democracy (SD), also with a bold headline and strong argument on the issue, taken to the May Day rally. Before the struggle broke out we had also organized a public meeting/symposium which drew together an array of labour leaders and workers from various affiliate unions of NLC and TUC in the state. It was apparently the appreciation of these roles of DSM that accounted for the election of Abbey Trotsky as a member of the Congressional Committee by the workers. While the strike lasted we issued a leaflet and two press statements which were widely reported. 125 copies of SD and 10 copies of the DSM pamphlet “Nigeria on the Cliff” were sold while not fewer than 15 workers from different unions indicated interest to join DSM.