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The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) have called on the federal government to reconsider going back to the old order, insisting that privatization of electricity companies has failed Nigerians.
The Anambra state chairmen of the two bodies, comrades Humphrey Nwafor (NLC) and Chris Ogbonna (TUC), spoke Monday, May 13, at the offices of the Nigeria Electricity Regulations Commission (NERC) and the Enugu Electricity Development Company (EEDC) in Awka, the state capital.
The Labor leaders led their members to picket the EEDC and NERC offices over the hike in electricity, describing the development as shameful
They marched from their office in Awka to the electricity companies with placards with different inscriptions, singing aluta songs.
Nwafor said: “We are pleading with the federal government to reconsider the privatization issue and reverting to old NEPA when the masses were having good light.
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“The individuals who were handed these companies have killed Nigerians. We will buy transformers and cables as private people, yet, the company will come and claim ownership and charge you big money without light too.
“Some areas stay for over a month without light, yet, EEDC will have the guts to bring huge estimated bills, impoverishing the masses the more and we’re saying,” enough is enough.”
The TUC chairman in Anambra, Chris Ogbonna, while addressing members, said the idea of increment in electricity tariffs should stop, adding that people were dying of hunger
He said: “How are we going to survive? The only thing they’ve not increased in Nigeria is age. Instead of increasing the masses, they’re decreasing us”
Ogbonna said the masses were tired of the extortions by the Discos and NERC, adding that the increment in everything in Nigeria was slowly killing the people.