Baba Aye's

Response to Osaze Lanre Nosaze's open letter It is quite unfortunate that not once in the 4,407 words of Osaze’s letter is there even the slightest mention of the defining issue of today i.e. the COVID19 pandemic. It shows how disconnected from changing the world his penchant for interpreting it is.* Anyway, I have neither the time nor the disposition for a long-drawn response, for the moment at least. But there are some outright distortions that need to be clarified and a few issues which I will summarily put in perspective regarding the claims and accusations made in his open letter. 1.        On “our phone discussion” and related matters -           Osaze claims that I or as he puts it, the SWL merely “wanted a CORE meeting held where the question of developing a programme for the organisation would be finalised and an expanded leadership established”. This is a half-truth.  -    ...

Introduction Trades unions have become key components of most modern societies be such societies democratic or totalitarian, advanced capitalist or backward post-colonial. The nature of trade unions and trade unionisms are however quite different, even in otherwise similar societies. The United Kingdom and the United States for example could be considered as similar as societies could be (being the leading “liberal market economies” in the world), but they have quite different types of trade unions and approaches to trades unionism. Similarly France and Germany, two leading “coordinated market economies” in the West, have clearly different trades unions’ characteristics. Coming closer home; on one hand there are distinct traits that mark the industrial relations systems and trade union practice as heritages of our colonial past i.e. along English-speaking and French-speaking Africa lines. On the other hand, there are specific features of trade unionism and trades unions even in the cl...