A group of Newswatch Magazine ex-staff members have called on the Senate President, Senator Godwin Akpabio and other principal officials of the Red Chamber to prevail on Senator Jimoh Ibrahim to pay them the 24-month salary alleged to be owing them.
Senator Ibrahim was said to have shut two of his media houses in 2016, the National Mirror and Newswatch daily and paid off the workers two-third of their entitlements.
According to a petition by one of the ex-workers, Tajudeen Adigun,Senator Ibrahim retained the Newswatch magazine, said to have been used for publicity in his 2016 campaign for governorship election under the umbrella of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Ondo State adding that at the time he contested the election, he was owing the Newswatch magazine workers more than a year’s salary.
Adigun said the salaries arrears had accumulated when he ran two post-graduate degrees at Cambridge and Oxford universities in Britain. Even till date, Jimoh Ibrahim did not officially close down the Newswatch magazine. The 2016 Ondo State governorship election took place in the last quarter of the year.
The petition states further; “The workers were still going to office till the first quarter of Year 2017, in the hope and expectation that the publisher would pay them their salaries. If he was no longer interested in publishing his magazine, he did not say and did not officially disengage the staff. So, the workers intermittently reported to work in dwindling number till March 2017.
“When it dawned on the workers that an end had come for the magazine, one of them, Tajudeen Adigun, a senior assistant editor, took the case to the Office of Public Defender in Lagos, asking them to compel Jimoh Ibrahim to pay the 24 months salaries he was owing them.
“All efforts to serve Jimoh Ibrahim the petition to pay the magazine’s workers were frustrated. Attempt to paste the petition on the wall of the magazine was equally met with stiff resistance and threat of violence by his goons at the office premises.
“At this point, the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Lagos Council, was approached to come to the aid of the magazine’s workers and help appeal to the Senate President to prevail on Senator Jimoh Ibrahim to pay their salaries.
“As we speak, one of the ex-workers, Aderotimi Adedoyin, has suffered partial stroke and bedridden. He is in need of money for treatment and to sustain himself.
“Senator Ibrahim is today a face of Nigeria’s democracy, as he was recently elected chairman of inter-parliamentary body worldwide. Regrettably, he has not demonstrated that democracy must be for the good of people, as he has treated the Newswatch workers as expendable who should be used and dump.
“What he has done is display utter distain for the workers, which also negates international labour law.
“The Senate is the highest legislative body in Nigeria that must champion making laws that will expand horizon of people’s freedom, increase people’s comfort and reduce poverty. Regrettably, Senator Jimoh Ibrahim is not using this yardstick. Rather, he is opposite of the ideals that the Senate stands for.
“The leadership of the Senate must, as a matter of fundamental duty, tell Jimoh Ibrahim not to soil or dent the good image of the chamber. He should be told expressly, to pay the entitlements of his ex-Newswatch magazine staff members”, it concluded
Below is the list of some of the affected former staff of the Newswatch magazine
Tajudeen Adigun – 08039180360
Adedoyin Aderotimi – 08038358391
Busayo Salako – 08082522140
Taiwo Schulz – 08028776449
Idowu Taiwo – 08183559331
Kayode Makinde – +13177847977
Yemi Adurotoye – 08055447307
Moses Hunyinsode
Segun Olakiitan – 08022115509
