By Victor Ahiuma-Young
TRADE Union Congress of Nigeria, TUC, weekend, urged workers and other Nigerians to  participate in the ongoing voter’s registration exercise. The union also announced that it had mobilised over 2,000 individuals to observe and monitor the exercise and general elections across the country.

TUC’s General Secretary, Chief John Kolawole, who disclosed this to journalists in Lagos at a briefing, said the congress had already concluded the training of members drawn from all parts of the country, adding that some of the national secretariat staff and the monitoring team had already been deployed to various locations to monitor the exercise.

Chief Kolawole said TUC had formally applied to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to be accredited to carry out the same function nationwide taking into cognizance the strength and capabilities of the union and also as an “independent non-partisan observer.”

He said, “this voter registration, we all must admit, plays an important role in the success or failure of an election. Because of the seriousness we attach towards freeing our dear country from the claws of flawed elections, TUC has constituted an election monitoring team known as TUC Election Monitoring Committee, TUCEMT.”

“This committee is composed of members who are experts on various fields of human endeavours and is vested with the responsibilities of directing the process.

“We have also committed our labour centre into a Domestic Election Observation team, DEO, with the collaboration of the National Democratic Institute, NDI, to function as the lead partner in the North Central States of Kogi, Niger, Benue and the FCT, while we will co-lead with the NLC for the North East with Adamawa and Taraba as our catchment states.”

Speaking further, the union scribe said the congress has began mobilising and sensitising the electorate on their rights to ensure that elections meet their expectations.