By Nneka Nwogwugwu
The Management of Kaduna Electric has explained reasons for recent power failure in the state.
The management in a statement informed its customers in Kaduna State that the service interruption currently being experienced in the State is as a result of the industrial action embarked upon by NLC.
According to the statement, ‘’In compliance with the NLC directive, the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN has knocked off all our 33KV lines in Kaduna State.
Consequently, we are appealing to all communities, security agencies and vigilante groups to be vigilant so that men of underworld will not cash in on the situation to vandalise power supply installations. Any suspicious movement around distribution sub-stations (transformers) or any other power supply infrastructure should be reported to the relevant security agency.
We have the collective responsibility to protect these critical national assets in our neighborhood.’’
Meanwhile, the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and its affiliate unions will on Monday embark on a five-day warning strike over the recent disengagement of civil servants by the state government.
The planned move followed Governor Nasir El-Rufai’s announcement in April to disengage civil servants in the state, citing fiscal reasons.
El-Rufai said a significant amount of the statutory federal allocations to the state is being spent on the wages of public servants.
But the NLC has vowed to resist the action of the state government, accusing the governor of not being sensitive to the plight of the workers.
Speaking in Kaduna on Sunday, Channels TV reports that the NLC Chairman in the state, Ayuba Suleiman, disclosed that the industrial action will be accompanied by a peaceful protest which will be led by the President of the Union, Ayuba Wabba and other labour leaders across the country.
He explained that the strike which will involve grounding of all socio-economic activities in both public and private sectors in a bid to force the Kaduna State Government to reverse the sack of over 7,000 local government workers and teachers and also suspend its plan to sack another 11,000 civil servants any moment from now.