“Workers’ Welfare, Development Quest Should Be Given Equal Attention In Osun”

Nofisat Adeoye

The State Government of Osun under the leadership of Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola has been urged to give equal priority to both infrastructural development and workers’ welfare.

Three prominent Nigerians including the head of Department of History, Obafemi Awolowo University, Mr Tunji Ogunyemi, the director of Ola Oni Center for Social Research, Comrade Wale Adebisi and the secretary of Nigerian Labour Congress, NLC,  Comrade Rufus Adeyemi, made this assertion during a roundtable discussion on Monday.

The discussion was organised by the College of Management and Social Sciences, Fountain University with the theme, “Development Quest and Workers’ Welfare In a Receding Economy; State of Osun in Focus”.

In his welcome address, the chairman of the college editorial board, Mr Olusegun Laidi, said the roundtable was geared towards examining the dilemma of which to prioritize between developmental projects and the workers’ welfare especially in a receding state like Osun.

After locking horns on the topic, the discussants agreed that as the state belongs to everybody, the State government should embark on projects which the ordinary citizens would also benefit from aside from paying workers’ salaries.

“Nigeria is fundamentally poor and Osun doesn’t not exist in isolation, it’s exist as a unit in Nigeria which has problem. Salute leadership for seeing a tarred road at all in Osun because its allocation from the Federal Government is nothing to write home about.

“If Osun were to pay full salary, the Government will not embark on any other infrastructural development and Government belongs to everybody, not just the civil servants.

“Everybody should be given equal right in terms of dividend of democracy, Government is not about paying salaries alone, that would be an injustice to other citizens.

“We can only urge the Government of Osun to give equal priority to both infrastructural development and workers’ welfare. The Governor should work on both sides.”