NLC equips members with knowledge, tools to protect migrant workers

Forum 1 year ago

NLC equips members with knowledge, tools to protect migrant workers

The Senior Assistant General Secretary, Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Mr Eustace James, says the three-day International Labour Organisation (ILO) supported programme of the congress would help in strengthening the capacity of trade unions.

He told the Newsmen in Lagos on Wednesday that the collaborative effort was part of efforts to protect the rights of migrant workers, and equip members with the knowledge and tools to achieve its objective.

The workshop, which was held from Monday to Wednesday in Lagos, had as its theme, “Strengthening Interregional Collaboration Between Trade Unions in Nigeria and Countries of Destination”.

It was organised by NLC in collaboration with the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

James said that the workshop aimed to improve the unions’ awareness on some tools that the NLC had developed in its work to contribute to migration governance.

“The first is the Information Guide: there is a guide that the NLC has developed and has validated, which is being operationalised now; it provides information on returning migrants on how they can better return and be re-integrated into the system.

“The second one is the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that the NLC has signed with the General Federation of Bahrain Trade Unions, which is one of the countries in the Middle East, on the protection of human and labour rights of migrant workers.

“All these are part of the trade union’s contributions to the global compact on migration which is about fair, orderly and safe migration.

“Article 23, also called objective 23, of that document is specific on interregional collaboration which we are strengthening here,” he said.

James said the way forward was for participants at the workshop to go to their work places and trash out issues of migrant workers.

He said: “We have a Trade Union National Platform on Migration in which participants automatically will members of the platform.

“It is a platform where we share issues, knowledge and drive campaigns and information on the protection of migrant workers.

“Each of the union persons here are focal persons of their unions that will further go and disseminate and domesticate whatever we are doing here in their unions.”

Also, the Chairman, NLC, Lagos Chapter, Mrs Funmi Sessi, described the workshop as an eye-opener.

She said it helped in setting the tone for trade unions to recognise that migrant workers were humans and needed all the assistance they could get.

“This workshop has already opened more horizon for us to be able to look into all those areas and issues.

“Also, to be able to make some recommendations for government in ways and manners in which migrant workers and their interests will be well taken care of and protected, “ Sessi said.

In her remarks, the Country Director, ILO Office for Nigeria, Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone, Ms Vanessa Phala, said the organisation was supporting NLC by ensuring that the MoU did not just remain as a document but effectively implemented.

Phala was represented by the National Programme Coordinator, FAIRWAY, ILO, Mr Austin Erameh.

“Going forward, we hope that the NLC is able to sustain this conversation with its affiliates; we hope that the strategies agreed upon during these sessions will be adopted, and taken forward by the NLC and its affiliates,” she said.

She expressed the hope that the information contained, not just in the MoU, but the Information Guide as well, would be used for the benefit of strengthening safeguard mechanisms for migrant workers.