The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has called on President Bola Tinubu to invite the leaders of a planned nationwide protest over hardship in the country, asking him to also address the challenges facing the citizens.

“As the date for the widely reported national protest looms, the Nigeria Labour Congress urges President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to invite the leadership of the protest movement for discussions on their grievances,” the NLC said in a Monday statement by its president Joe Ajaero.

The NLC chief said with inflation hitting 34.19 per cent coupled with the hike in food and electricity tariffs among others, there is a need for President Tinubu to address these challenges.

“It is, therefore, condescending and dismissive to describe the daily brutish ordeal that Nigerians are going through as a sponsored political dissent. Even if it is so, it is still within the confines of citizens’ rights to protest on political grounds. Just that the current unease in the country does not need political motivation to spark and splurge,” Ajaero said.

“All that the hurting citizens demand from their government is a listening ear and an empathetic heart. Maybe, that is what the organisers of the protest are looking for given their continued notices on different social media platforms.”

‘Dire Times’
It faulted what it described as the “hostility” of the Nigerian government toward the planned protest, saying it does not “offer any tangible remedy either to the pain endured by the populace or the frustrations of having so little in a country where a few privileged persons are living in obscene luxury, especially at the expense of the majority. These are dire times. Nigerians are angry”.

“The times require the government to ‘jaw-jaw’ and not ‘war war’ with Nigerians. The truth is that you cannot smack a child and at the same time ask the child not to cry,” he said.