Enugu Govt declares Judiciary workers strike illegal

The Attorney Gen­eral and Commis­sioner for Justice, Enugu State, Hon Meletus Eze, has declared the strike embarked upon by the Judicial Service Union of Nigeria (JUSUN) state chapter over non-im­plementation of their en­hanced consolidated salary structure as illegal.

The AUTHORITY ob­served that all judicial work­ers both in the Magistrate Courts and the state High Court yesterday embarked on strike to protest the non-implementation of their salary structure in line with CONJUSS.

The entrance gate to the state High Court in Enugu and others like Magistrate Courts, Customary Courts and many others were locked up thereby prevent­ing Judges and Magistrates from having access to their various courts for business­es of the day.

Attempts to let the Chair­man of JUSUN in Enugu State, Barr Chinedu Mba, to comment on the strike was not fruitful. His GSM phone was permanently switched off. But the state Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Hon Eze de­scribed the strike as illegal, saying the present admin­istration in the state is not owing the judiciary workers any salary.

According to him, the is­sue of consolidated salary for Judiciary workers came to the table in 2010 after Chief Judges came together with the CONJUSS and im­posed same on states.

He said that JUSUN took the proposal to states and demanded that it should be implemented. However, Enugu State Government, he said, took the matter to the National Industrial Court and on September 23 2016, the state government secured an injunction bar­ring the workers from going ahead to coerce government into adopting the salary structure.

He disclosed that the Ju­diciary workers did not ap­peal against the injunction and wondered why they took the option of strike even when a committee has been set-up by the state government to resolve the impasse. - The Authority