The strike by the Judicial Staff Union of Nigeria (JUSUN) continued yesterday as the Federal Government for the second time announced an indefinite postponement of a reconciliatory meeting between its officials and leaders of the union.
The announcement was contained in a statement issued by the Deputy Director/Head, Press and Public Relations of the Ministry of Labour, Charles Akpan.
Recall that members of the Judiciary Staff Union of Nigeria (JUSUN) had since April 6 shut down all courts across the country, in protest against the non-implementation of the financial independence of the judiciary at the state level.
The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, had scheduled to meet with the JUSUN leadership and others, including the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), on April 15.
But the meeting was called off at the last minute, prompting both JUSUN and NBA to hold separate protests across the country on Monday.
The meeting was then rescheduled to hold on Tuesday.
But the statement issued on behalf the labour minister said the meeting, which was also meant to involve the representatives of the Parliamentary Staff Association of Nigeria (PASAN), had to be postponed to afford the government time to harmonize issues arising from various meetings.
The statement reads , “ the postponement is to enable the Federal Government negotiating team to harmonize all issues from the Memorandum of Understanding reached at separate meetings with tiers and arms of government.
“The minister this was necessary to ensure that the meeting with the unions comes with a Memorandum of Action which is implementable with time lines.
“There is no point rushing to do a meeting that will be fruitless. The judiciary, the governors’ forum and even the presidency are involved in this negotiation because the meeting (which) held yesterday was at the Office of the Chief of Staff to the President.
“The arising documents are not yet properly harmonized. It will therefore not be fruitful to hold a negotiation where people speak from irreconcilable positions. It won’t help us and it won’t help the unions either.
“The postponement is to ensure that the agreement reached at the end of our meeting here is put into action, with timelines for implementation.
“So, if we don’t have a paper that is ready to go, then there will be no point for the talk shop.”
