Former Secretary General Organisation of African Trade Union Unity (UATUU) Comrade Owei Lakemfa has said that organising is an integral part of trade union growth and progress.
Comrade Lakemfa said this in his lead paper at a three-day Leadership and Organising Academy for members of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) and its affiliates, organised by Solidarity Centre.
He said: “Every leader and member of a trade union is consciously or unconsciously, an organiser.”
Lakemfa described organising as a lifeline to trade unionism, just as blood is to human body.
“A union bereft of organizing is a sick union and if not attended to, will die because organizing is like blood to the human body, it has to constantly flow. You have to organize the unorganized and un-organize the organized.. What he meant was that organizing is like an ever flowing stream,” he said.
In his address, TUC President Comrade Festus Osifo expressed delight at the positive turnout of female unionists.
Osifo admonished the participants to be attentive and interactive in order to achieve the aim of the training, which is tailored towards harnessing good leadership qualities and organizational skills.
He further commended the organisers for partnering TUC and providing complete funding for the program.
Also in welcome address, Country Program Director West Africa Region Sonny Ogbuehi said for the past 20 years, the centre had been training and re-training of Nigerian workers among the two labour federations.
In his paper tilted ‘Building Worker Power, Strategic Organising,” TUC Secretary General Nuhu Toro exposed participants to ways of building modern trade union, factors affecting union leverage , future organizing strategies and sources of union power.
Also delivering a paper, a gender activist, Janet Anaele, explained the differences between “GENDER/SEX, gender as being Determined by social factors—history, culture, tradition, norms, religion, age and class, while sex as being determined by biology.”
She defined gender mainstream as the process of assessing the implications for women and men of any planned action, including legislation, policies or programmes, in any area and at all levels.
Furthermore, she expounded the approaches to promoting gender equality, strategies and tools for gender mainstreaming, the role of union in promoting gender equality and International policies as enshrined in the International Labour Convention (ILO) Convention 190 which vehemently prohibits gender-based violence and harassment.