Abuja -The National Union of Textile Garments and Tailoring Workers of Nigeria (NUTGTW), has urged the Federal Government to formulate policies for quick revival of the textile industries to boost the economy.
The Union’s General Secretary, Mr Issa Aremu, made the call at an Africa Union Roundtable to mark the 2015 Africa Industrialisation Day, in Abuja on Thursday.
Aremu regretted in spite of Nigeria’s abundant natural resources and potential for an industrialised nation, the country only harboured “ the biggest industrial cemeteries”.
“Former functional and productive industrial estates of cities like Lagos, Kaduna, Aba, Port Harcourt and Kano now harbour closed hundreds of industrial plants with attendant millions of mass job losses.
“The restless unemployed youths, that have become foot solders for dangerous forms of violence from terrorism to secession, must be kept positively busy in the factories through decent mass employment in the factories,” he said.
Aremu pointed out that no country with a huge army of unemployed youths could survive social revolution.
He advised the new Minister of Industry to visit both the closed and functional factories to appreciate the task at hand.
According to him, the manufacturing industry, which once contributed as much as 24 per cent of the nations GDP, now contributes less than four percent.
“The industry sector is not competitive in Nigeria because of high cost of production which increases the prices of products,” he said.
He noted that the collapse of the crude oil price had made the economic diversification a necessity, and urged President Muhamadu Buhari to to see that Nigeria moved out the tight box of the extractive industry.
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Aremu called for an industrial action plan with strong industrial policies that recognised manufacturing as a key engine of growth for national economies.
“We must reinvent the Nigeria Customs Service to help the Nigerian economy through vibrant anti-smuggling campaigns and aggressive revenue generation,” he suggested.
The General Secretary, Industriall Global Union, Mr Jyrki Raina, in his remarks, said that the problem of inequity was a major challenge facing the union, and regretted that there was no proper health insurance for workers.
He advised government to prevail on every individual and company to pay tax to ensure adequate funds to pay workers’ wages. (NAN).