JUST IN; Tinubu’s Minister locked out of Ministry by aggrieved Workers
JUST IN; Tinubu’s Minister locked out of Ministry by aggrieved Workers
Federal Ministry of Women Affairs workers locked out Minister Imaan Sulaiman-Ibrahim on Wednesday, September 10, in protest of what they called prolonged neglect and other issues.
A large number of employees blocked the ministry’s gates in Abuja’s Central Area, chanting solidarity songs and demanding the minister’s removal.
According to the protesting workers, the demonstration was a last resort. They claimed that multiple attempts to meet with the minister to resolve their grievances had been ignored.
“The Minister was deployed to the Ministry in October last year, and since then, she has not had any meeting with the workers nor the unions. After several efforts, she fixed a meeting with the unions and staff on Wednesday, and we were glad. Every staff member, including the Permanent Secretary and all the Directors, was seated since morning waiting for the Minister.
“We waited for the Minister for about four hours, because we were told she was returning from a trip. Surprisingly, she snubbed us when she arrived. She never said ‘hello’ to us nor even apologised for keeping us waiting for several hours. Rather, she gave us silent treatment and went to her office. We waited patiently for about an hour for her to come down, but she never did. That made us express our grievances,” a staff member said.
One of the union leaders, Alake Success, told journalists that the Minister is someone who doesn’t care for the staff. “In fact, the immediate-past Minister, Uju Ohanenye, is far better than her. In our Ministry, there are no working tools, statutory welfare, training, and several other issues.
“We don’t see the usefulness of the overhead allocation to the Ministry. The Minister and her over 25 aides use the money. We use our personal funds to work for the Ministry. Cleaners are no longer in the Ministry. We clean the toilets ourselves; we buy stationery ourselves.
“We have met with the Permanent Secretary on this matter, and she confirmed that she has made several efforts but received no positive response from the Minister. We have no option but to register our discontent through peaceful protests.”
They called for the Minister’s removal or reassignment to a ministry other than Women Affairs.
As of press time, the ministry gates remained locked, and the Minister had neither addressed the protesting workers nor responded to their allegations.
