WORKING IN NIGERIA
It is no one's wish to work like an elephant only to eat like an ant, yet an average person would rather eat like an ant than starve to death all together. Which is why a lot of Nigerians have fallen victim to exploitation and the vices of modern slavery, even though we have labor laws that are supposed to protect us from those very pitfalls and more.
Sadly, Nigeria's labor laws are selective and non-inclusive at best as it does not even cover executive, administrative, technical or professional roles and often times, the stipulations designed to protect the employee has been turned to the favour of the employer instead.
Perhaps, the shortcomings of the Labor Act are not so glaring in the public sector, where public staff are at liberty to report an injustice without necessarily facing the perils of losing their means of livelihood. However, the same cannot be said for the private sector where employees face a greater risk, especially at the hands of foreign employers who are confident in their ability to evade the law.
Employees are made to work round the clock, with little or no guarantee of an overtime pay. They face all sorts of harassment which they can not report, because hardly anything is ever done about the few cases reported. In some corporate organisations, female staff are cajoled to engage in all sorts of debauchery in an effort to keep up with competition and meet unreasonable targets with time limits.
Most of the factory workers do not have health insurance or proper working equipment, even though they work in hazardous conditions.
Some are put right to work immediately without proper orientation or training.
And in the eventuality of death or fatal injuries, little or no compensation is availed and portions of their wages or salaries are deducted for petty reasons. Yet, people continually work in such horrible conditions, subjected to modern day slavery and facing inhumane treatments on a daily basis all because they feel they have no choice.
Perhaps, the worst part of all this, is the fact that a majority of these inhumanities are perpetuated by foreigners living in our country who now seem to have more rights and privilege compared to an actual Nigerian citizen and have no qualms with rubbing this unfortunate abnormality in our faces. Like taunting a motherless cub.
But Nigerians are not motherless and we cannot continue to subject ourselves to pathetic helplessness when we have a government to look up to and a constitution to ensure our rights to fair treatment.
The labor law act should be upgraded in a way that is more inclusive and less ambiguous, so that employers would not continually take advantage of the loop holes.
The need for an on-the-job training also cannot be over-emphasised. It is crucial to improve the quality of service delivery of an employee, so that employees continually add capacity to themselves and increasing value to the organisation.
A lot has been said concerning the minimum wage, but not much has been done and this has always been a concern, more so now than ever considering the economic state of the country. Therefore, an improved, and internationally comparable wage system should once again be developed and promptly implemented.
As regarding the matter of expatriates working within our borders, there have always been laws designed to regulate the admission of expatriates into Nigeria. All that is left to do is for the necessary authorities to ensure that these regulations are thoroughly enforced.
For instance, an expatriate should not be employed to fill in a position that a citizen within our country's locality can easily fill in. Therefore, unless it is a job requiring technicality or a level of expertise which can not be obtained within the country, an expatriate should not be called upon.
To ensure that such stipulations are upheld, recruitment opportunities should be formally and properly publicised before the option of an expatriate is even considered. Still, credible evidence of substantial effort at local recruitment must be presented along with request for expatriate visas, along with the expatriate resume demonstrating the locally unavailable competencies.
Furthermore, labor offices should be properly located and equipped in order to be able to promptly respond to the reports from an individual or an organisation concerning any cases of a breach of legal and binding contracts or infringement upon a fundamental right provided for in the labour laws.By so doing, Nigerian citizens can once again be reassured in the government to protect their best interest and be assured of working in safe and conducive work environments. This will in turn, encourage productivity, and be of overall benefit to the nation's economy.
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