By Bob MajiriOghene Etemiku
Abuja – Trade Union Congress of Nigeria’s political roundtable 2022 on the role of organized labour in promoting participatory democracy and good governance recently turned into a war of words, with Saharareporters Publisher, Omoyele Sowore accusing former Ondo State Governor, Olusegun Mimiko of betraying Chief MKO Abiola.
Chief Abiola was the presumed winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election which was annulled by the Military Junta, headed by retired General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, throwing Nigeria into serious political turmoil.
The roundtable event which held at the Musa Yar’Adua Centre in Abuja, March 10, 2022 was supposed to bring stakeholders together to chart a common cause towards the 2023 elections. Rather, it threw up old and new political rivalries and issues that will set the tone for the 2023 elections.
Earlier in an address of welcome, Comrade Ayodele Olorunfemi, chairman of the political commission of the TUC in presenting a background for the TUC meeting took a swipe at the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, accusing it of being disorganized.
“Workers should play a key role in the entrenchment of Democracy. Most of them are not involved in the policy-making process. If they were, they would not be as disorganized as they are today,” Comrade Olorunfemi said.
But it was Attahiru Jega, former INEC Chairman and chairman of the occasion who appeared to have thrown the first punch against the political elite. As part of his opening remarks, Prof Jega told his audience that Nigeria under the Muhammadu Buhari administration is being badly governed.
“All the indices of bad governance are starkly evident: from the fraudulent ways and means by which conceited elite impose themselves as ‘elected’ leaders in governance; to the reckless, self-serving, corrupt, exclusionary, visionless, parochial and unpatriotic disposition and manner they have been ‘governing.”
To back up his claims that Nigeria is being badly governed, Prof Jega made available three tables from Nigeria’s ranking on Major Global Indicators, the ECOWAS Countries ranking on perception of Electoral Integrity 2018 – 2019 and the ECOWAS Countries Ranking in EIU Democracy Index 2020.
Bigwigs present at the TUC roundtable included Comrade Abiodun Aremu, Issa Aremu, Femi Falana (who joined via Zoom), Jaiye Gaskiya, Prof Jubrin Ibrahim, Dr Mike Omotosho, Hauwa Mustafa, Olusegun Mimiko, former governor of Ondo State and Omoyele Sowore, Sahara Reporters publisher and presidential candidate. Ambassadors from Cuba, the Saharawi Republic and Venezuela were present at the TUC roundtable as well.
In a lead presentation, Prof Toye Olorode who is a member of the secretariat collective of the Peoples Alternative Political Movement, TPAOP-M said that there is need for the transformation of Nigeria from an under-developed capitalist neo-colonial Nigeria to a socialist Nigeria for the benefit of all Nigerians irrespective of their ethnic origin religion or tribe.
“It is important to have a struggle for genuine democracy based on power and social economic interests of the masses rather than the interests of the rich few. This is because Nigeria is gradually turning into a zoo, and we cannot survive with an alliance with the ruling class parties. They are an embarrassment to the generality of the Nigerian people,” Prof Olorode said.
But tempers flared just after Olusegun Mimiko, former Ondo State governor embarked on a review of panel session during the roundtable. Mimiko who said that he is ‘a practicing politician’, told the participants at the TUC roundtable that there were abundant opportunities for politicians to advance the cause of the Nigerian people, said he was happy that the TUC had ‘woken up to conscientize workers on the plight of Nigerians.
“The crisis in Nigeria is existential, and we are confronted by a security challenge that we’ve never seen in Nigeria before. Therefore, we must give political conscientization to workers by educating them after you mobilize them. We must be flexible and creative in our effort to get our people to participate in the democracy,” he said.
Speaking from a virtual platform, Femi Falana, SAN, said that instead of holding separate roundtable sessions, both the TUC and the NLC should fuse for the purpose of rebuilding and ‘recovering’ the Labour Party of a strong body to align with the new radical forces in the country.
“I will not want to join issues with any of the speakers other than to look at our recent history and to state that those who currently frustrating the emergence of the Labour Party or the ‘recovery’ of the Labour Party should not be allowed to deceive us.
“With reference to issues of recovery of the Labour Party, we are in court; and the court has said that the two factions of the Labour Party should have a unity convention. One side has made that impossible, with the notion that there is no way they can continue to use the Labour Party as a dumping ground for politicians rejected in APC or PDP.
“I think this is an opportunity, seeing that former Governor Mimiko has just spoken: the elements led by him in the Labour Party, before he decided to form Zenith Labour Party, have made it impossible for the Labour Party to be united.
“Therefore, if he wants to contribute to the recovery and growth of the Labour Party, this roundtable should appeal to him to call upon his members to allow the Labour Party to be properly ‘recovered’. A Labour party is not for elections but a fighting tool, fighting on behalf of the people every day,” Femi Falana said.
When he got the opportunity again to speak, former Governor Mimiko fired back at Femi Falana, accusing him of being the arrow head of the forces that crafted the narrative that sent Goodluck Jonathan out of office in 2015. He left after that.
But there was one person in the Atiku Abubakar Hall of the Musa Yar’Adua Centre who itched to say something, and that was Omoyele Sowore, Revolution Now Leader and publisher of Sahara Reporters. He said it was a painful thing that former Governor Mimiko had left because he actually intended to call him a liar to his face.
“Governor Mimiko was actually one of those who betrayed MKO Abiola during the June 12 1993, and he has the predilection to always do so. Everything he has come here to say to you is a lie.
“While some people trying to govern Nigeria are currently pissing on themselves, former Governor Mimiko is a part of the system that has presently kidnapped Nigerians and then asking them for ransom. He has been in the PDP, Labour Party, back to PDP and now is in Zenith Labour Party,” Sowore told the participants.
Officials of Zenith Labour party were also involved in the war of words. “We must tell Femi Falana that he alone does not have monopoly of the law. The things he has said about a ‘recovery’ of the Zenith Labour Party are outrageous and we call on him to apologize. There is nothing to ‘recover’ in the Zenith Labour Party,” an official of the party said during the roundtable.
On March 2, 2022, the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, organised a 2022 workers political conference with theme, ‘Commitment to National Emancipation and Development through Effective Political Engagement’ in Abuja.
Even though it was devoid of the kind of acrimony that characterised the TUC, the template for the outcome of the 2023 Presidential elections in Nigeria is already being formulated.
