Electricity Tariff hike: Labour shuts JEDC offices in Benue

The Benue State offices of Jos Electricity Distribution Company, JEDC, were Monday shutdown by the leadership of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, Benue State Chapter, in protest over the recent hike in electricity tariff in the country. 

The NLC State Chairman, Comrade Terungwa Igbe, who led the union officials and members to JEDC offices in the state, locked up the offices after directing the staff of the company to vacate their premises. 

Comrade Igbe said the action was in compliance with the national directive of the union over the hardship faced by Nigerians due to the increase in electricity tariff. 

He noted that the tariff hike was unacceptable, stressing that they were demanding a reversal with immediate effect. 

The Chairman said: "We went to all JEDC offices today and closed them down. We locked up all the offices and addressed the workers. It is a national directive. The message was that the hike in tarrif should be reversed." 

He stated that the offices would remain closed for now pending the directive from the national body. 

Reacting to the development, the Head of Corporate Communications of JEDC, Dr. Adakole Elijah appealed to the unions to allow their workers do their job since they were rendering essential services lamenting that the development had crippled official work in the company. 

Dr. Elijah said "It is true that the NLC in conjunction with TUC infiltrated our offices and they never allowed any of our staff to enter into their offices. Our official work was completely crippled, we didn't do anything. 

"We will appeal to the unions to allow us do our job because we are on essential duties. If at the end of the day we couldn't, it will become more problematic because it will definitely affected not only the social life but also the economy of the state negatively." 

He pointed out that "When problems arise and we are unable to attend to them because of this picketing, it will not help us. So we appeal to them to allow the essential workers managing some critical segments of the company to do their work."