The strike, which was called on June 13, was the labour’s response to the disagreement between the union and the state government over government’s proposal to involve private partnership in the management of some secondary schools in the state. The state government had sought an exparte order from the court to stop the strike called by the state’s NLC but it was set aside while the court fixed Thursday as a date for both parties to appear before it. Chairman of the state NLC, Waheed Olojede, said the strike was actually called by the national body of the union after it was made to understand that workers in the state had not been paid six months salaries. Speaking with our correspondent at the NLC secretariat in Ibadan shortly after a congress of members of the union on Wednesday, Olojede said, “What really happened was that the state government approached the NIC to stop labour from going on strike. But the government got it wrong because the strike had begun before it sought the order and because we had never written the government informing it that we were going on strike. “The order was denied while the court decided to put the two parties on notice to appear before it on Thursday. The state executive of NLC did not order the strike, rather, the national body did after seeing the plight of our workers who have not been paid in the past six months.” At Wednesday’s congress, Olojede informed workers that they should be steadfast in the struggle to make the state government pay their salaries, saying that workers’ demands were backed by the simple rule of contract and employment that mandates employer to pay its employees after they must have fulfilled their part of the agreement. He said, “We are only asking for what is rightfully ours. We have worked and the simple rule states that we should be paid what was agreed as wages.” ]]>