A civil society group, Gatekeepers of Democracy (GOD), has faulted Wale Ojo-Lanre over his recent comments targeting the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) in the ongoing face-off between Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan and leadership of the National Assembly.

The group accused Ojo-Lanre of attempting to discredit organised labour, which had earlier expressed support for the senator in her confrontation with some NASS members. A statement signed by group’s National Convener, Umar Kaltungo, described Ojo-Lanre’s article published on The Niche platform, as “an attempt to divert public attention from the real issues of democratic governance.”

While maintaining that OjoLanre’s remarks undermined the role of the NLC in defending democracy and workers’ rights, Kaltungo urged stakeholders to focus on addressing the core issues raised by Senator Natasha rather than resorting to “personal attacks” on the labour movement.

The statement partly reads: “The struggle for democracy is a workers’ struggle. You cannot reclaim economic rights without first reclaiming political rights. Silencing voices like the NLC will only embolden anti-democratic tendencies” in the country’s governance structures.

Kaltungo further argued that the exclusion of a duly elected senator amounts to an attack on democracy and, by extension, the economic rights of workers. “A legislature that can arbitrarily suspend opposition voices is a legislature that will never pass a pro-worker minimum wage bill. “A system that invalidates the votes of the people in Kogi Central is a system that will never be accountable for unpaid salaries and pension arrears.”

Kaltungo who commended the NLC for its bold interventions in recent months, citing its stance on issues ranging from pension reforms to corporate accountability, stated that organised labour’s voice “rings louder and clearer than ever before” and should not be silenced by criticisms that seek to limit its scope of advocacy to only industrial or wagerelated matters.