Baba Aye's

Introduction The 1st trilateral conference of Ghana TUC, Nigeria Labour Congress and Congress of South African Trade Unions held on May 4-6, 2010 at Accra, Ghana. The Conference arises as a response to the multifarious challenges confronting African working people in general and the working class in Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa, particularly. The Conference had evolved as an idea over the past six years based on the need to forge greater trade union unity across the African continent in the spirit of international working class solidarity. The persistent and continued underdevelopment of Africa and the pauperisation of its working people are traceable to the characteristic inequalities fostered by the capitalist mode of production, particularly in its neoliberal incarnation. The force socially positioned to checkmate and change this situation, being the working class; the need for the working class movement of our three countries to forge ever greater unity and solidarity, in th...

I must say above any other thing, I do agree with you, Sam and join you in calling on your two colleagues to join in and put together the Working Paper. You actually occupy the primary baton-changing position having served in the convening triumvirate and now being the only one of the earlier three in this next and immediate phase. With regards to the CDC triumvirate, I must say that, that is another thing entirely. I would have been of the opinion that communiques should be adopted at meetings and taken away by those in attendance. If for any reason, 'i's are to be dotted and 't's to be crossed it should not be more than days after the conference. The longer a communique's issuance is dated from the conference whose resolutions it embodies the more questions of legitimacy, mandate and relevance arise. That haven been said, I see no reason why Hilary and co should not now release it this week. While really, there might be lessons to learn from your excursion into th...

Dear Sina and Biola, First I must say to Sina that time never gets on any person or revolutionary group's side. On the contrary, we have to get to the side of time. The old GG (as against the Darah we now know) spoke at a guest lecture we organized on the PAYCO platform in 1992. An analogy he used stuck in my mind. He considered the revolution as the biblical groom that five wise and five foolish maidens were waiting for. The five wise maidens represented a revolutionary movement's existence and readiness. The foolish ones whose oil had run out of course were the 'revolutionaries' full of lots of talk and little or no oil to last the night. How many times will we say all we need is to get organised more than ever only to repeat it again year in, year out? And Biola, I not only pointed out our 'past failed efforts'. Any movement or revolutionary tradition without such is one that never really exists...The problem is not even just that of our continued current and...

Dear Chinedum, Thanx for your posting, please. I had earlier emailed Otive, Sam and Carol, demanding the issuance of the Conference's documents as a signpost of the way forward after March 21, through discussions on the serve. Carol responded pointing out that the triumvirate had done its bit and commendably (I totally agree with that view, not only did it take them much less than tor organise the Conference than the the time it seems to be taking for the results of the same Conference to come out (!); they also gave us an immediate synopsis of the meeting vide Otive's posting in less than 24 hours after). She referred me to the members of the Communique and Working paper drafting committees. I forwarded the same email to the CDC (since I saw its task as preceding that of the Working Paper Committee's as at then). There was and has been no response whatsoever to this by any of the following that are its members: Boniface, Kenneth and Hilary. My thinking has been: if the Co...

Dearest Carol, A million thanx for yours below. Yes the immediate report by Otive was quite good and inspiring, which made me even more seeing the Communique, even more desirable and especially subsequent action to sustain the laudable effort. I will forward the query below to the three gentlemen collective of rapporteurs that you stated, herein under. Warm regards, . Baba Aye (I immediately forwarded the same email earlier sent to CA, OI & SA, to the Communique drafting triumvirate. NB: BA) ____________________________________________________________________________________ Date: Friday, April 10, 2009, 11:00 PM Dear Baba Aye, Many thanks for your well thought out email. Legitimate as your enquiries are, none of us undertook the Rapporteurs' assignment. One great lawyer Odewale volunteered, declined at the last minute. Another great Lawyer Hillary Ogbona out of the richness of his heart stepped in at short notice. So the list consisted of: Ken Okoine...

Date: Friday, April 10, 2009, 8:16 PM Dear compatriots, Once again, I can not but start by commending your leadership roles in ensuring the summoning of the March 21 meeting. That it held is as well something to be cherished by all patriotic and change-seeking Nigerians. I am however constrained to ask the following questions: * When is the communique (and even if with less urgency: report of proceedings) be issued? => in my opinion, and from the traditions I work within of the trade union movement (I have similarly noticed this in a number of CSO platforms I have participated in), the communique is actually something to be issued immediately after a Conference. This vests it with the legitimacy of being an expression of the resolve of the meeting's participants, just as they see it and did there and then resolve on. This is is iportant for constructing mandate as a popular articulation, in my view, please. Thus, three weeks after, could we be better appr...

21st March, 2009 Dear Compatriots, This is to let you know that the Abuja 21st March meeting was held in Abuja as scheduled. The meeting was attended by 56 persons. Most of the participants came from Abuja but the discourse was very rich. All the scheduled lead presenters for the three sessions (Sam Amadi, Joseph Sopade and Osaro Odemwingie) were present. One of the discussants (Jaye Gaskia) was present. The second discussant (Ms. Comfort Ogunye) was represented by two persons. The two moderators (Otive Igbuzor and Auwal Musa Rafsanjani) were present. Emma Ezeazu also joined the team of moderators. There was a robust discussion on the need for a broad based inclusive movement for change. It was agreed that the mobilisation for change should ultimately produce a democratic and developmental state. It was also pointed out that there is the need to engage the electoral process (electoral reform and the conduct of elections) and the governance process (citizen participation, openness, tran...

A STRATEGIC ANALYSIS OF THE CHANGE WE NEED IN NIGERIA: Some thoughts on the draft concept paper. I welcome this opportunity to contribute towards operationalizing the concept of political changes we need in our country at the moment. In doing this, the first theme of this contribution is my thinking that there is no need to reinvent the wheel. If Sir Isaac Newton can see further than his peers merely by standing on the shoulder of giants, we can also excel in the current quest by taking a look at political models that worked elsewhere – in comparable institutional settings and adapt such models to the Nigerian condition. Supposing somebody asks the question: why do we need change in the country or change for what practical purpose? I find that some possible answers to such questions have been tucked away in the preamble of the draft concept paper. Building a consensus around these answers, to my mind is imperative because it is when there is a fair consensus as to where we are going th...

CONCEPT NOTE FOR THE MARCH 21ST MEETING 1. PREAMBLE This concept note gives the context of the March 21st meeting, the main issues to be discussed and suggested agenda. 2. CONTEXT OF THE MEETING The idea for this meeting arose from debates on the Freedom of Information (FOIC) listserve. Many commentators drew attention to the challenges facing Nigeria and concluded that the only solution is a “revolution.” The debate then centred on what kind of and how revolution can take place in Nigeria. One commentator mentioned that there are at least two initiatives currently going on in Nigeria to bring about change: movement for change and movement for social transformation. The debate then shifted to how we can bring about change and the roles that members of the listserve and other progressive Nigerians could play in the process. The idea was then mooted that there should be a meeting to brainstorm on how to change and transform Nigeria. 3. DIVERSITY OF THE FORUM This meeting is coming from...