There is now a very sharp disagreement between the Federal Government and the labour/civil society coalition planning a popular protest from August 2nd, 2023 across Nigeria.
While the labour/civil society masterminds are talking about a system change, something more than shutting down the government is against, the FG is saying that the right to peaceful protests does not include justification for disrupting or shutting down essential services.
There is a fascinating resort to metaphorical governmentality at work here in the distinction between peaceful protest and shutting down essential services. It is thus either there will be a protest in which labour is central without disrupting essential services which doesn’t look possible or the FG will be ignored.
Should the push come to shove, one interesting paradox there will be why a regime headed by a practised activist (of pro-democracy, NADECO) as President Tinubu will be unwilling or uninterested or unable to handle this with a surgical soft power approach.
Anyway, the judicial contestation over that naughty segment promises to be an interesting one as the artillery force of the Law Chamber to which the FG’s letter is addressed confronts either Dele Alake’s informational governmentality in the coming hours or some similar encounter.
According to Mrs. Jedy-Agba, the Permanent Secretary for the Federal Ministry of Justice who signed what is appropriately a protest note to Femi Falana’s Chamber, “it is grossly inappropriate to lead public protest in respect of issues relating to or connected with fuel price increase, which are currently before the court on the issue”. Although the protest note grants the right to protest, it says Barrister Falana (SAN) should induct the movement to the effect that “the current move by NLC goes beyond peaceful protest by issuing a seven-day ultimatum for government to meet its demands and also embark on a nation-wide action to compel government to reverse alleged anti-worker policies”.
Relying on what the Permanent Secretary’s missive calls uncontroverted media reports, it makes a distinction between a peaceful protest and “intending to ground the government by endangering public peace, instilling fear in the masses, precipitating further crisis”, inferring that what the NLC/civil society is up to is the latter. The letter takes as evidence what an Assistant General Secretary of NLC has been quoted as saying, viz “Nigerians should be prepared. … Being prepared means you have to stock food in your house and be economical with your movement at this particular point in time so as to avoid being stranded…”
Presidential Adviser on Information and Strategy
It takes an even longer quotation, this time from the Nigeria Union of Petroleum & Natural Gas Workers and National Union of Electricity Employees to demonstrate the notion that grounding the society as opposed to peaceful protest is in the work. The long quotation goes as follows: “The NUEE is an affiliate of the NLC and I’ve told you that we will join the strike action. The issue is that if there’s a deadlock between labour and the government; that means that the mass protest is still going on, and definitely electricity workers, as an affiliate of the NLC, will partake in the mass protest. So, all workers in the power sector will join the mass protest on Wednesday, August 2, 2023. It is binding on every staff member to join the strike action. So, if it results in a blackout, the only option is for the government to listen to us if it wants power to return.”
There is a critical dimension in the letter in the invocation of the teething arms of the state except the military. The invocation is in the act of copying the National Security Adviser; DG of the State Security Services (SSS) and Inspector-General of Police.
Making the labour/civil society position clear earlier on, the core civil society platforms involved said in a statement that a mass protest would begin August 2nd, 2022 against government policies regarded as neoliberal.
Among the policies are hike of petrol from N617 to N195, fee hike in public tertiary institutions, devaluation of the naira, rejection of the planned electricity tariff increase, meeting of demands of striking doctors, other health workers, education workers like ASUU and all other unions, adequate funding of public education, payment of all owed salaries and pension and the signing of a new National Minimum wage.
The key groups in the forefront of the impending protest are Alliance for Surviving COVID-19 and Beyond (ASCAB), Coalition for Revolution (CORE) and the Joint Action Front (JAF) and they are guaranteeing the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) of their solidarity in calling out Nigerian workers and the masses out to a protest.
The threesome rose from a meeting calling “on the Nigerian working people and youth to see the August 2nd date as the beginning of nationwide resistance against fuel price hike and other anti-poor policies”, said the statement signed by Lagos lawyer Femi Falana, activist Baba Aye and Achike Chude for ASCAB, CORE and JAF, respectively.
“The ultimate aim is SYSTEM CHANGE which is only achievable through a revolutionary struggle to end the condition of mass misery”, said the statement.
The assumption that President Tinubu would undercut the protest in his Monday, July 31st broadcast has not materialised. Although the Government showed awareness about the mounting cost of living instigated by a wave of neoliberal dosages, it did not repeal any of the policies in contention.
Those who privilege stability over other competing values would have preferred that in view of multiple challenges engulfing the country. A standoff may still be avoidable as there are still more than 48 hours in-between, depending on which honest brokers might be at work.
