Flight operations at Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport, Kano, were paralysed for several hours on Wednesday following an industrial action staged by staff of the Nigerian Meteorological Agency.
The protest led by members of the Amalgamated Union of Public Corporation, Civil Service Technical and Recreational Employees left several air passengers stranded due to flight delay.
Although normalcy has returned with scheduled flights taking off and landing as at the time of filing the story, Guardian confirmed that the Nimet office remained under lock and key.
It was gathered that the Union had forced staff of Nimet out of the office and locked up the manager whose office refused to vacate to register displeasure over non-implementation of the new national minimum wage.
A staff member of the airport who spoke on via telephone interview revealed that the protest has disrupted many flights, forcing the airport authority to cancel or delayed the flights.
“As you know flights are determined by weather and NiMet is the one providing weather information to pilot. So, even though some flight operations are still going on but the protest has affected many flights,” he said.
Timoty Meshelia, the Northwest zonal Chairman of the Amalgamated Union of Public Corporation, Civil Service Technical and Recreational Employees told journalists that the protest had disrupted a number of flights at the airport.
He added that the union had demanded the Management take proactive measures aimed at addressing the economic challenges faced by staff, including the payment of a Subsistence Allowance as agreed with the unions.
“The protesting staff are accusing the management of NiMet of non-implementation of N30,000 and N70,000 minimum wage, nonpayment of staff allowance, ignoring requests for inclusion of omitted staff in the past payments, neglecting key training programmes among others.
“The association has given the Management one month within which to implement the new minimum wage or face industrial action,” Mesothelioma said.
