WORKERS of the Nigeria Railway Corporation (NRC) have appealed to the Federal Government to review their remuneration along with ongoing reforms in the corporation.
They stated that the rehabilitation of workshops, rail tracks and purchase of locomotive engines and coaches without upward review of remuneration would continue to impede on their performance and output.
The Secretary General of the Nigeria Union of Railway Workers, Segun Esho, said this in Enugu during a thanksgiving service organised by the workers to celebrate their victory at the National Industrial Court (NIS). The court had ruled in the union’s favour on a dispute with the Federal Government over the implementation of the monetisation exercise.
Esho, who observed that railway workers’ welfare was neglected, stressed that they remained poorly paid compared with their counterparts in the air and water sectors, a situation that might rubbish investments the NRC.
He said: “We want government to get railway workers properly rehabilitated and transformed. You don’t concentrated on rehabilitating workshops, rail tracks, locomotive engines, buying coaches and engines and landscape, without the exercise positively and directly impacting on the lives of the workers. This is why we advise government to review the remuneration of workers.
“For example, in the air industry, the pilot is the king; imagine how much he earns. In the water sector, sailors, whether a government employee or a merchant sailor, earn fantastic money. But in the railway sector, a driver, who operates a locomotive that was bought at over N500m is on level six or seven. He is driving the engine along with the coaches and other facility attached to it; but he is poorly paid.
This is why we want the ongoing reforms in the rail transport industry to have a human face; it should have a perspective.
This is why we want the ongoing reforms in the rail transport industry to have a human face; it should have a perspective.
On the ordeal of the workers in the court, he lamented that it was only in the railway sector that Federal Government’s 2005 monetisation exercise was not implemented.
He stated that when the policy took effect the leadership of the corporation sold vehicles, sacked drivers and implemented the consolidated salary scheme, but that the aspect empowering workers, who occupied the NRC residential quarters, to take possession of it in line with the policy was not implemented.
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