By Demola Akinyemi

A Nigeria Farmers group under the aegis of the Farmers Economic Empowerment Association (FEEMA) which spread across states of the federation has said that it will no longer accept  Bajaj Motorcycles to its members who work as labourers in exchange for settlement of labour wages to foreign nationals as from during this year annual farm season.

Before now, the farmers group had being settling foreign nationals from neighbouring countries including Benin republic, Togo, Cote D’Ivoire and Chad employed to work on their farms during each year farming season by buying Bajaj Motorcycles for them whenever they are going back to their respective countries.

The group at its national conference held recently said that instead of their usual practice of buying motorcycles as a means of payment for farm labour from the foreigners, it has accepted that individual labourer would be paid a sum of N400,000 as fee for work done in the 2023 farming season while wages in the subsequent years would be determined by the amount of work done in a particular season.

FEEMA’s section (Iso Agbe) of the Obada Market, Kishi, Irepo Local Government Area of Oyo State reached the resolutions at it National conference held between September 10 and 14,2023.

Presenting the resolutions to the National Chairman of FEEMA, Professor Abubakar Ali-Agan in Ilorin, Kwara state on Saturday, a delegation led by Alhaji Abdulhameed Baba-Epe said that the resolutions were reached at the conference attended by members across the country including ;Oyo, Kwara, Kogi, Niger, Ekiti, Osun etc among other states.

In the Communique presented to Professor Ali-Agan which was signed by Alhaji Adam Giro Tijani and Barrister Al-Amin Bayo Adewale, National Vice Chairman and National Secretary respectively, “the association affirms the fact that farming is the backbone of the national economy and any anomaly or dispute in the agricultural sector connotes a serious danger in the feeding of the nation and hence, this need to take the bull by the horn.

“At the said Conference, the members observed the anomaly of payment of a unit of Bajaj Boxer motorcycle by the members of the association to each labourer,  even though, the quantity of the works done does not amount to the exorbitant price of the motorcycle being paid”, adding the members noted that the arrangement involved uncertainty and leads to deception and reluctance to work on the part of the labourers as many of them work far below the agreed daily expectation.”

It added that “The convention on ground is that each labourer would plough among others about 0.3 acres of land daily, while most of them hardly plough 0.1 acre of land per day and each labourer anticipates a unit of Bajaj Boxer motorcycle at the end of the year.

“The members unanimously agreed within themselves that another area where the labourers mischievously gain and the farmers are innocently pained is the short duration of work of their work. Most of the labourers arrive lately in the season around April, May or June, when many works would have been done by some other persons whose wages and rewards would have been settled by the farmers.

“The association deemed it pertinent to note here that purported convention has severally resulted in disputes, rancour, and unrest that had given the members of the association, the labourers, their guardians, the traditional institutions as well as the security agencies such as the Nigeria Immigration Service, the Nigeria Police, the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, the Western Nigeria Security Network (Amotekun) and other security task forces established in various states headache and sleepless nights”, it lamented.

The Association however resolved that “the members shall pay the sum of Four Hundred Thousand Naira (N400, 000) only as the reward, wages and or workmanship to any labourer employed for the ongoing farming season in year 2023 and “that as from next farming season, the wages of the labourer shall be determined by quantifying and or estimating each work carried out by the labourer as this involves transparency and is devoid of any attempt to cheat which may be observed from any of the two parties.”

It further said, “That the above are arrived at with a view to allowing the reign of peace and forestalling avoidable crises in the farming parlance and our communities in general.

“That any member that contradicts in dealing with labourers, any of the above is on his own and shall be sanctioned by the association”, it said.

In his speech, Ali-Agan called on Nigerian youth to embrace farming and take up the farm work so that the resources being paid the foreigners would be spent in the country.

He commended the farmers Association on its efforts to meet the food needs of the people of the country as well as export.