Daily Watch – Unions to ignore court order on strike, Chad chooses oil over Unesco recognition

The Attorney-General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami (SAN), has written a letter to the Presidential panel probing the suspended acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Ibrahim Magu. Malami, who is also the Minister of Justice, told the panel led by Justice Ayo Salami that he would not be able to appear before the investigative body because of the privileges of his office. The development comes less than two weeks after the AGF said he would appear before the panel to testify if he was invited. Magu’s legal team led by Mr. Wahab Shittu, had subpoenaed Malami, demanding that he appear before the panel to substantiate the allegations he preferred against the suspended EFCC boss. One of Magu’s lawyers, Mr. Tosin Ojaomo said Section 174 of the constitution does not give the AGF such privileges. “Isn’t it funny that the AGF who levelled a series of allegations against Magu is now refusing to substantiate the allegations that emanated from his office?” he was quoted by The Punch as saying. Magu was suspended in July based on some reports by investigative panels set up by the Attorney-General. The panel was supposed to have ended its sitting since last month but was given a six-week extension which ends this month.

Several persons have been injured in an explosion that occurred at Cele Bus stop, Iju Ishaga area of Lagos on Thursday. Cars, shops and houses near the scene of the explosion were also burned. The Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA) said the explosion was caused by a truck conveying petrol. A nearby mini-market was also razed by the inferno and electric cables in the area destroyed. Ibrahim Farinloye, the acting coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency, said a tanker filled with petrol was trying to enter a gas plant at Iju and exploded before entering.

Chad has asked to suspend an application for world heritage site status for Lake Chad to explore oil and mining opportunities in the region, the UK Guardian reports. In a leaked letter, the country’s tourism and culture minister wrote to Unesco, the body which awards the world heritage designation, asking to “postpone the process of registering Lake Chad on the world heritage list”. The letter says the government “has signed production-sharing agreements with certain oil companies whose allocated blocks affect the area of the nominated property”. The nature of the agreements and the identity of the companies have not been made public. The letter asks Unesco to “postpone the process” in order to “allow [us] to redefine and redesign the map to avoid any interference in the future”. The request follows a multiyear process involving the governments of Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria to jointly nominate the Lake Chad cultural landscape to the Unesco world heritage list. It has been nominated as both a natural and a cultural site. It comes as a blow to the other countries’ delegations, who had not been informed of Chad’s oil ambitions in the Lake Chad basin. If Chad decides to go ahead with oil exploitation, the process would have to be cancelled all together, Unesco said.

The Nigeria Labour Congress and the Trade Union Congress have dismissed the ruling of the National Industrial Court restraining them from going on strike from Monday. Justice Ibrahim Galadima of the industrial court in Abuja, on Thursday, issued an interim order restraining the unions from embarking on the strike following an ex-parte application filed by a group, Peace and Unity Ambassadors Association through their counsel, Sunusi Musa, and also granted an order of interim injunction restraining the unions from disrupting, restraining, picketing or preventing the workers or ordinary Nigerians from accessing their offices to carry out their legitimate duties on 28 September 2020 or any other date. The court also granted an order compelling the Inspector-General of Police and the Director-General, Department of State Services, to provide protection for workers engaged in their legitimate duties from any form of harassment, intimidation and bullying by the officers, agents or privies of the unions pending the hearing and determination of the motion on notice. Reacting to the court injunction, the NLC President, Ayuba Wabba, dismissed it, saying he had not been served, adding that the group that filed the suit was not his employers. Following the hike in electricity tariffs and fuel pump price, the government and the unions have met multiple times, but all attempts at dialogue have ended in deadlock following the failure of the government to reverse the price increase or offer palliatives to cushion the effects on the workers. A meeting between the FG and the unions ended in deadlock on Thursday evening.