The seven-week old strike action embarked upon by the Osun State workers’ over the non-payment of their salaries by the Governor Rauf Aregbesola administration may be called off today as temporary agreement is said to have been reached between the government and the labour union in the state.
Sources at a meeting held between the Chief of Staff to the governor, Alhaji Gboyega Oyetola and the labour leaders under the leadership of Comrade Jacob Adekomi, at the weekend in Osogbo, told NewTelegraph, that the government appealed to the workers to call off the strike while the labour leaders reportedly insisted that, ‘no bank alert, no resumption’ of work.
The outcome of the meeting was said to have been deadlocked, as the government request was based on conditionality while the leadership of the union reportedly insisted that alert of salaries payment on handsets of workers by banks, would determine when the strike would be called off. It was further learnt that the workers told the government that if the workers receive payment alert on their hansets today, they will call off the strike, while the workers would resume tomorrow and if otherwise, the strike will continue.
It would be recalled that, some traditional rulers in the state who were in attendance during the meeting also pleaded with the workers to call off the strike. Their spokesperson, Akinrun of Ikirun, Oba AbdulRauf Olawale Adedeji, said, “One does not need to look at the crystal ball to know that the Aregbesola administration has in the last four years been busyturning the state around in all ramifications.’’
They stated that government ran into troubled waters, owing to the national financial crisis the whole nation was struggling to wriggle out of. They therefore warned that the current situation should not be politicised by those who were seeking to capitalise on the situation to score political points. The monarchs equally appealed to the government to intensify its effort towards resolving the problems. Thisday
