Election petition tribunals sitting across the country may be shut down this week as the Judiciary Staff Union of Nigeria (JUSUN) announced that it would join the Nigeria Labour Congress in a strike over the removal of petrol subsidy.
The judicial workers’ union in a memo dated June 3 said its members would proceed on a solidarity protest strike with the Nigeria Labour Congress on Wednesday.
“This is to inform all branches and chapters of our great union across Nigeria to begin mobilisation for a nationwide action and withdrawal of service,” the memo said.
Isaiah Adetola, one of the JUSUN executives who signed the memo, said the strike would affect all judicial workers, and the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal will have to shut down.
“We cannot watch as Nigerian poor masses are dying on the streets because a government said there will be no going back on subsidy removal,” Mr Adetola said. “That cannot be a realistic or acceptable situation for the Nigerian workers.”
Mr Adetola said Nigerian workers are not necessarily against removing subsidies on petrol, which have been in place since 1970s, but decried the manner with which Mr Tinubu ordered the policy.
JUSUN, with over 120,000 members, is the latest union from a critical sector to join the budding industrial action led by the NLC.
