By Oscarline Onwuemenyi

THE Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Chukwuemeka Wogu, is not one to walk away from a fight. Over the past year, the bulky red-capped middle aged chief from Abia State has squarely taken on the challenge of ensuring industrial harmony in various sectors of the economy as well as creating – or inspiring resources to create – the much needed jobs for a teeming army of unemployed in the country.

Remarkably, the Minister who was welcomed to office in April 2010 by striking civil servants has in the year under review against many odds helped to weave a harmonious industrial environment for the Goodluck Jonathan administration to realise its goals. His efforts, including painstaking unofficial courting of labour leaders have paid off handsomely for the administration in political, social and economic terms.

Indeed, staff of the ministry note with pride the numerous late night meetings with representatives of organized labour in the country, held often to resolve labour disputes or nip them in the bud where possible. One of such negotiations between the minister and representatives of the Nigeria Labour Congress and the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, NUPENG, over threat by the union to down tools reportedly lasted for weeks before it was resolved.

Minimum wage
Wogu under the direct supervision of his bosses, President Jonathan and Vice-President Nnamadi Sambo were able to satisfy the long demand by Nigerian workers for an upward review of the National Minimum Wage.

The Minister who stepped into the negotiation process once he was appointed last year with a humble appeal to the patriotism of labour negotiators was able to bring them to lower their demand from N52,000 to N18,000. It is to Wogu’s credit that he was able to win the confidence of the presidency in facilitating the Presidential assent to the national minimum wage bill. The assent to the bill no doubt was a political mileage for the President for not only did it meet the expectation of labour, it also staved off a potential threat to the recent elections.

Indeed, weeks before the general election that returned President Jonathan to Aso Rock, one of the major issues had been whether he would assent the new Minimum Wage bill passed by the National Assembly. Debate over the bill, which demanded an increase in the stipend received by public servants to N18,000, had raged on and it seemed the President’s – and other politicians’ –  electoral fate was hanging on how they treated the demand by organized labour made up of the Nigeria Labour Congress and the Trade Union Congress. After weeks of hide and seek, the President signed the bill days before the election and all is now history.

Chief Wogu in the year under review also guided the enactment of the Employees Compensation Bill which aims to smoothen the process of resolving industrial accidents. The radical legislation which was also assented to by President Jonathan is expected to boost the level of workers’ confidence in the workplace with the assurance that their persons are insured.

It is perhaps a reflection of his successes that he was recently called upon to serve in the interim as Minister of Interior.