Nigeria is experiencing blackouts as workers of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), on Wednesday embarked on their planned strike action, shutting down the electricity national grid.
The workers under the aegis of the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE), embarked on the strike following the directive of the TCN Board that all principal managers who are in acting capacity must undergo promotion interviews.
Earlier on Tuesday, the workers had vowed to commence on strike today (Wednesday).
Early morning on Wednesday, things appeared normal. However, at about 10am, the grid dropped from 4,149 Megawatts recorded at 6am to 2,600MW.
It later dropped to 939.4MW at 3pm, and finally recorded zero generation at 4pm.
The aggrieved workers were seen in Abuja blocking the entrance to the TCN headquarters, the building that
houses the Federal Ministry of Power, where the Minister of Power and the Minister of State, Power have their offices.
In his letter directing electricity workers to embark on strike, NUEE General Secretary, Joe Ajaero, had explained that the directive for the promotion interview was in contravention of the workers’ condition of service and career progression path.
Noting that the action was done unilaterally without the relevant stakeholders, Ajaero frowned at what he termed “stigmatization of staff from the office of the Head Service of the Federation from working in other areas in the power sector.”
He decried the “refusal of the Market Operator to fund the payment of entitlement of ex-PHCN staff as agreed in December 2019 agreement after an industrial action by the union”.
It was learnt that the workers union shunned the pleas by the Minister of State for Power, Goddy Jedy-Agba to be given a two-week grace to allow the government address the issues raised by the workers.
The FCT Branch Chairman of NUEE, Godfrey Abah, who spoke to Vanguard said the action would continue until the governmemt meet their demands.
He said, “As citizens and as a labour union we want supply to be everywhere but you know that the only weapon we have is to withdraw our service and that is what we have done. We have withdrawn our service to enable the government to attend to our needs and do what is right.
“The ball is in the court of the government and they know what to do. We have just received an invitation for tomorrow (Thursday) and before the close of business today we will know if the meeting will be held. We are ready for the negotiation”.