By Femi Falana SAN(Being the text of the keynote address delivered at the Pan-African High-Level Dialogue on Accountability in Lagos, Nigeria, 10-11, September 2026)
INTRODUCTION – THE WRONG QUESTION
The organisers of this dialogue have posed a question which is both timely and provocative: Have We...
All these strikes and protests need our support and solidarity. We call on all trade union branches to send messages of support and to organise solidarity visits to any strikes in their localities.
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), its member unions and others organise massive protests across the country in solidarity with the education strikes. The trade unions have yet again shown their ability to organise huge protests in all state capitals.
We believe that the Charter provides an important set of demands. First, any politician who is asking for support from the millions of workers and other toiling people should be asked to accept the Charter as a basis for their manifesto.
The left, with its basically socialist ideology, has been historically and consistently on the side of the labour movement, in its widest sense, in Nigeria since the colonial period.
By Femi Falana.
Since the days of the struggles against colonialism workers and their leaders have always been interested in the question of political power. Generations of the broad left have nursed the consciousness that the problems in the political economy, as they affect the working people, cannot be fundamentally solved if workers are indifferent to the fundamental question: who “authoritatively” allocates resources and in whose interest? Who defines what is development?