SYSTEM CHANGE NOW!!
The Joint Action Front (JAF) salutes the working people in Nigeria and
their counterparts across the world on the occasion of this year 2012 MAY DAY,
which is the 126th Anniversary of the struggle led by workers in
Chicago, USA in 1886 that has become known and celebrated as May Day. That
struggle, which claimed the lives of some of the workers’ leaders, ensured that
working hours, which used to be for as long as 16 – 20 hours a day for poor
wages were regulated to 8 hours work a day and workers all over the world are
entitled to a definite condition of service and the rights to associate and
unionise.
WHY WORKERS MUST LEAD THE STRUGGLE FOR SYSTEM CHANGE?
Workers are daily retrenched,
unemployment continues to grow and prices of goods and services are
rising. None of the
public and private employers is paying the Minimum Wage according to the spirit
and letter of the 2011 Minimum Wage (Amendment) Act. The above are some of the hardships
created by the present corrupt
system.
The lesson of the January 2012 protest led by the Nigeria Labour
Congress (NLC), Trade Union Congress (TUC) and JAF is that a struggle for system
change is a legitimate struggle that workers should not shy away from and the
need for a POLITICAL ALTERNATIVE to replace the present rot. The January
protest could not achieve the set goal of FUEL PRICE REVERSAL to N65 because
the leadership of the protest, in the absence of a POLITICAL PLATFORM of the
working people and the poor, succumbed to the blackmail and threats of
militarisation and violence by the Jonathan presidency and the Governors’
Forum.
Nigerian working people should realise that we have a patriotic duty and
legitimate right to drive away every bad government and unjust system and
replace such with a government/system that would be committed to the
socio-economic transformation of their life and
the use of the collective wealth of the society for the common good of all as
against the greed of few.
On this 2012 May Day, JAF calls on the Nigerian workers and working
people generally to embrace and support the struggle for SYSTEM CHANGE, which
has become inevitable in the light of the recently released Report on Oil
Subsidy’s thieves by the House of Representatives and the desperation by the
ruling cabals and their associates in thievery to undermine the prosecution of
the subsidy rogues indicted in the report.
The main challenge before the Nigerian workers is the unjust system and JAF has consistently maintained that SYSTEM
CHANGE should be the goal. Nigerians have no option but to struggle for SYSTEM CHANGE and the Nigerian workers also have no option but to
lead the fight for SYSTEM CHANGE.
ARE WE REALLY FIGHTING CORRUPTION?
Privatisation, Deregulation,
Commercialisation, Concessioning, subsidies withdrawal and devaluation
of the Naira are the
real issues in promoting and sustaining corruption. These wicked policies so
called economic reform or transformation agenda by successive military and
civilian regimes are aimed at looting our collective wealth.
Nigerian workers and the working people need to rise above the present
anger for the prosecution of the oil thieves. We have passed through similar
routes before (power probe, etc) with shocking revelation but none of the
culprit has been prosecuted to date. Instead, we need a determined struggle to
put an END to all these deceitful economic policies imposed on Nigerians since
the era of military rule. All those policies such as SAP, Vision 2010, NEPAD,
NEEDS/SEEDS/LEEDS, Vision 2020, 7-Point Agenda, Transformation Agenda, SURE, etc,
are ‘same of the same’; aimed at looting. These policies are dictated by IMF
and World Bank. Nothing good can come to the people on the account of these
wicked policies. Therefore, workers need to know that it is what happens in the
economy that determines how governance is conducted.
If the Nigerian workers are to genuinely fight corruption and ensure JUST governance, we must be prepared for a struggle that should seek to
rid away the unjust system that is
responsible for corruption. We must struggle for a SYSTEM CHANGE that would guarantee Nigerians basic
necessities of life as guaranteed in Section 16 of the 1999 Constitution
on the Economic Objectives of Government, which include: national minimum
living wage, old age care and pension, State control of the major sectors of
the economy, etc.
JAF says it is not enough for the National Assembly to pass resolution
for the prosecution of the looters and profiteers of the oil subsidy, it has a responsibility to put in place legal and constitutional measures that should:
·
Ensure the reversal of
the neo-liberal economic policies of privatisation and deregulation – the main
architect of corruption;
·
Expunge plea-bargain and
light sentences for corruption offenders and make the minimum sentence 25 years
imprisonment with hard labour to offenders; and
·
keeping public the major
sectors of the economy under democratic control of workers and relevant
professonals.
THE WAY
FORWARD
JAF urges the Nigerian workers and the working people not to agonise but
to work towards a National Campaign to rally Nigerians towards a POLITICAL
ALTERNATIVE as a way out of the present decadence. DARE TO STRUGGLE, DARE TO
WIN!
Reject
the IMF & WORLD BANK POLICIES!
Rid
Nigeria of looters and Profiteers!
Reject the N97 Fuel Price and Resist the plot by FG
and Marketers to further increase fuel prices!
Demand for SYSTEM CHANGE to guarantee Full
Employment and wealth creation, Revival of local industries, Revitalization
of Education and Health sectors, etc
Mobilise
and Participate in Mass Actions declared by JAF and its allies!!
DR. DIPO
FASHINA
Comrade ABIODUN AREMU
JAF
Chairperson
JAF Secretary
