PHCN workers seek divine assistance for power
ELECTRICITY workers in Abuja wednesday joined their counterparts nationwide in prayers to seek divine intervention in the troubled power sector.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the special prayer sessions focused also on the insensitivity of government and its agencies toward the plight of workers of PHCN.
The one-hour prayer session, which began at the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) corporate headquarters' in Abuja at 9.00 am, was organized by the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE).
According to the Abuja Branch Chairman of NUEE, Mr B.C Uzowuru, the prayer session took place simultaneously in all the nine zones of the PHCN.
The aggrieved workers called on God to empower them to "see the end of PHCN saboteurs and the death of any power that wants to devalue PHCN."
They also prayed for spiritual strength to take the battle for workers welfare to a logical end.
Uzowuru admitted that the prayer sessions were successful considering the level of compliance by union members.
"We know that prayer can make a difference in the act of inhumanity perpetrated against workers in PHCN.
Workers are working judiciously, yet there is nothing to show for it," he said.
Recalling the union's opposition to the government's privatisation of PHCN, Uzowuru alleged that there were no concrete plans to adequately pay-off NUEE staff on the retrenchment list.
He stressed the need for the resolution of all labour issues before any recourse to privatisation.
It will be recalled that President Olusegun Obasanjo had directed BPE to suspend all process of privatisation in PHCN until power services improved.
In the PHCN revival plan, all the chief operating officers (COO's) of distribution, generation and transmission were expected to report to Mr Joseph Makoju, who the president re-deployed as the chief executive officer.