Monday 28 January 2008

STRUCTURAL ADJUSTMENT PROGRAMME AND NIGERIAN LABOUR MOVEMENT:---

STRUCTURAL ADJUSTMENT PROGRAMME AND NIGERIAN LABOUR MOVEMENT: A CASE OF NIGERIAN CIVIL SERVICE UNION




BY




MU’AZU M. YUSIF
Department of Political Science
Bayero University, Kano






Two-Day Seminar for Local Union Leaders of the Nigeria Civil Service Union, Kano State Council







Organised by Bayero University Consultancy Services Unit, Kano from 7th – 8th February, 1994, at the Federal Secretariat, Kano



Introduction
The impact of SAP on the organised Labour Movement is devastating. Its effect on the economy of Nigerian workers has bred organisational and political lack of confidence on the Managers of labour affairs. Yet workers, as individuals and through their organisations have put up resistance against the on-slaught of SAP on their living standard and have joined broad struggles to improve the conditions of everybody. The Nigeria Civil Service Union symbolised these struggles.

The Civil Service
First what is the civil service? What constitute the civil service? In ordinary Language, all workers in the public sector are called civil servants. The concept is used to differentiate workers in the public sector from that in the private sector. Narrowly speaking and for our purpose of addressing members and leaders of civil service union, the civil service include only workers in the Federal and State Ministries. According to a 1981 statistics out of 2.3 million people in the modern sector wage employment 1.3 million, or 58 percent were in the public sector. Within the sector itself, the civil service, i.e. representing Federal and State Ministries, carried 261,000 (11.3%) and 427,000 (19%) respectively. This implies that in the public sector majority were in the civil service.

Labour Unions in the Civil Service
Trade Unionsm in Nigeria originated in the civil service. Historically, the number of unions in the civil service are not numerous, although nearly one hundred unions operated in the civil service before 1978 reorganisation of the Trade Union movement in Nigeria. In that year, more than 1,000 unions were re-organised. During that exercise the number of unions in the civil service has been reduced to eight.

In the following table the names of these unions, the number of unions that were merged to make them and their approximate estimated membership as at 1982 is shown:

S/N
Names of the Unions
No. of Unions merged
Approximate membership 1982
1.
Civil service Technical workers union of Nigeria
30
150,000
2.
Nigeria Civil Service Union
22
60,000
3.
Nigerian Union of Civil Service Typists, Stenographers and Allied Staff
2
12,000
4.
Printing and Publishing Workers Union
13
2,143
5.
Medical and Health Workers Union of Nigeria
17
20,000
6.
National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Mid-wives
3
25,000
7.
Customs, excise and Immigration Staff Union
2
14,000
8.
Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria
2
90,000

The Nigerian Civil Service Union
The history of Trade Unionsm in Nigeria indicate that the first trade union formed was the Nigeria civil service union, organised in 1912.

It first started as Southern Nigeria Civil Service Union but later changed its name to Nigerian Civil Service Union after the amalgamation of the protectorates of Northern and Southern Nigeria.

Infact, before the 1929 Economic Depression, the politics of Nigeria labour movement was dominated by that of the Civil Service Union. During this period and even after formation of other organised unions in the public sector, before the Second World War, the civil service union championed most of the improved changes of conditions of service in the public service.

The 1978 Trade Union restructuring which reorganised all the Trade Union organisations into 42 Trade Unions came with one central Civil Service Union, with a national structure and state councils. That gives the present structure or Civil Service Union, Kano State Council.

SAP and Nigerian Workers
With the rejection of the IMF structural adjustment loan by Nigerian people, the Government of Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, still came with another programme in collaboration with IMF which contains all the conditions of the financial institution. This is called SAP.

The conception of SAP is economic policy package which will open the economy to world big business, along the way to temporarily diversify exports, achieve fiscal and balance of payments viability, be able to pay foreign debts and strengthen the private sector.

The main strategies of the programme, in order to achieve the above stated conception is the rationalisation and restructuring of public expenditure, customs tariff and hence the civil service. Also are adoption of free exchange rate policy combined with liberalisation of the external trade and payments system and adoption of market forces principles on everything particularly the pricing policies.

In order to achieve these objectives through the strategies so employed certain policy measures came into being. These policies are:
1. Withdrawal of petroleum subsidy
2. Privatisation and commercialisation of public enterprises.
3. The emergence of liberal foreign exchange of market determined rates
4. The liberalisation of external trade and payments
5. The deregulation of interest rate, such that it is determined by market forces
6. Wages freeze and later wage deregulation

In effect, the implementation of the above policy prescriptions and others has brought a lot of hardship on Nigerian people especially the wage-earning group. Members of NCSU for example are horribly affected through:
1. Retrenchment of workers in the name of rationalisation of the public service
2. Like workers elsewhere, members of NCSU are going through, declining living conditions caused by declining value of the currency, stagnant wage level and increasingly rising inflationary trends.
3. Increasing difficulties because of virtual commercial value of Health Services and Education of the children of workers.
4. Unemployment as a result of retrenchment and closures of enterprises which brings more people under the dependency of “ordinary” workers, which is a burden on their wages.

SAP and the Labour Movement
In discussing the impact of SAP on Nigerian workers, it is necessary to treat it also on the level of politics. The SAP has indeed introduced a lot of unimaginable difficulties on workers. For workers the only solution is to abolish the programme. Therefore, while they are fighting to improve their conditions under the programme, their long-term objective is to get the policy measures abandoned. On the other hand the Nigeria’s state wants make that a permanent standard on the people. As such every political measure is to curtail human rights of Nigerian workers. A statement by Nicholas Van Hear captures the essence of this when he says:
“Wages freezes and other restraints on pay bargaining are a common concomitant of structural adjustment. Constraints on organisation remain in place for implementation (of) free market policies require authoritarian regimes, under which freedom of organisation and association are fragile”.

The transition programme of the Babangida Government imposed many restrictions on workers involvement in politics. Trade Unions activities are limited by repressive actions of the state. Labour leaders are under constant harassment and surveillance by the state. Security surveillance on ranks-and-file and labour activists in their places of work, disturb their consciousness and confidence of actions. Some labour leaders allow themselves to be co-opted into the political and economic structures of the state.

However, inspite of everything, Nigerian workers have resisted every act against their interests and interests of Nigerian people in general. The example of Nigeria Civil Service Union, Kano State council is a case in point. The Union, using the umbrella of Nigeria Labour Congress, Kano State Council fought to secure the implementation of SAP relief package and went against retrenchment of its members.

The Nigeria Civil Service Union is the workers group very closely related to state. The leadership therefore needs to develop extra commitments and direction to deal with forces against the interests of workers. In order to defend the interests of workers, leadership in this union requires a high spirit of loyalty to the union, above personal interests, and subjecting the method of work to democratisation of decision making.

Conclusion
It is worth noting for leadership of workers union that while struggles to defend interests of workers using legal procedures is not unnecessary the method of strike is also effective where employers do not have respect for procedures and the negotiated agreements.

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