Nigeria’s Minister for Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo SAN, has warned the organised labour in Nigeria to beware of losing its time-honoured respect and dignity by disallowing self-annihilation via the politics of the Labour Party.
He also warned that if the organised labour represented by the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) to stop targetting the aviation sector or be ready for a fightback.
Keyamo warned at the three-day Ministerial Retreat for the Permanent Secretary, Directors and Heads of Agencies of the Ministry held at Effurun, Uvwie Local Government Area of Delta State.
He lamented the attempt to disrupt his flight from Abuja to Warri on Thursday morning by elements of the labour unions who protested the brutalisation of the NLC chairman, Joe Ajaero, in Owerri last week at the Abuja airport.
He said the ministry was not involved in Ajaero’s arrest and brutality by security agents.
In his reaction to the labour unions’ actions at the airport, Keyamo, a former Minister of State for Labour and Productivity, said, “Aviation was not involved at all, but their target is aviation.
“Their retaliation is Aviation. So, please, I want to tell them to leave us alone. Leave Aviation alone. You cannot target Aviation in trying to address your grievances.”
He said the protests affected foreigners coming into the country and Nigerians going about their normal businesses.
He accused the labour protesters of disrupting aviation activities by blocking the access road to the Abuja International Airport.
Keyamo, who is in a familiar terrain being a legal practitioner and having been in the trenches of human rights agitation before,
warned the labour unions to separate labour activities from politics.
“I pray, and I am talking directly to them. Do not allow the Labour Party to destroy the labour movement. Do not allow the Labour Party and politics to destroy the Labour Movement.
“Call your leadership to order. Don’t get stuck in politics. It will destroy the labour movement.
“I’m grounded in this. I’ve been with them for years, so they cannot deceive me. What they’re doing is politics. It’s not the Labour Movement. It’s politics.
“You cannot use that platform to go and support a party different from my party when you’re fighting back; you say it’s the labour movement. No, it’s not. You should be ready for the consequences if you play politics.
“The protesters are hirelings of the Labour Party, and it’s not good for the image of the labour movement.
“They cannot be hirelings in the Labour Party and they used them at their will. That’s why you see that the labour movement does not control the policies of the Labour Party,” he further warned.
The Delta-born lawyer, however, condemned the alleged arrest of the NLC National President, Ajaero, as he maintained that nobody should be manhandled.
“I condemn what happened to my friend, Ajaero. Nobody should get fisticuffs but in the same breath, they should not find themselves in the realm of politics,” he warned.
Meanwhile, Keyamo, while underscoring the essence of the retreat in his opening address, said it was for top management staff from the ministry and agencies, with the theme Delivering On The Renewed Hope Agenda.’’
“This is apt because one of the major goals of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Administration is to position the Nigerian Aviation Industry as a Hub on the African continent and the world.
“More so, Aviation is key and central to any sustainable growth and development in all other sector of the Nigerian polity,” he averred.
Dignitaries at the opening ceremony of the retreat included Thomas Ereyitomi, a member representing Warri in the Federal House of Representatives, among others.
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