Labour warns against negative impact of nation’s security challenges on human capital

Organised labour has decried the unabated security challenges in the country, saying that the situation is fast depleting the country’s human capital.

Labour leader, Isaac Aremu who lamented the impact of the insecurity facing the nation on the economy, said that Nigerians have observed this ugly situation through “avoidable killings of innocent working people, workers, journalists, farmers and herders”.

Aremu who is a member of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) National Executive Council (NEC) and General Secretary Textile Workers Union, raised the alarm of the depletion on the country’s labour force in Zaria while on a condolence visit to the family of Precious Owolabi a youth corper with Channels Television who died from a gunshot wound he sustained at the scene of the clash between the police and protesting members of Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) last Monday in Abuja.

Aremu said that insecurity related problems have a wider negative impact on human capital development if unchecked by the government. According to him, while significant progress has been made to train human resources in a number of educational institutions, Nigeria is depleting its skilled hands through violent conflicts.

Aremu recalled that the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT) has lost as many as 1000 teachers to incessant killings and abduction of school officials by armed bandits in Zamfara state and other parts of the North East.

He further lamented that insecurity has been the daily woes of the majority of Nigerian workers calling on security forces and employers to protect workers in the areas of conflicts, including journalists, adding that notwithstanding the national hysteria about rampant kidnappings, robberies, rural banditry and terror attacks, the mass insecurity victims are the poor defenceless working people.