Nigerian human rights activist and convener of #RevolutionNow movement, Omoyele Sowore, has described former governor of Edo State and former National President of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), Adams Oshiomhole, as “Agaracha” labour leader who was never and has never been an activist as he makes Nigerians believe.
Sowore mentioned this when he appeared in a podcast held by Glitch Africa Studios which SaharaReporters monitored on YouTube.
The former presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC), noted that Oshiomhole had a deal with Nigeria’s former military head of state, Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida to carry out the first fuel price increment in Nigeria in 1992.
He recalled how the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) under his (Sowore) leadership in 1992 held a world press conference where they named Oshiomhole the enemy of students because he was part of the orchestrators of the first fuel price increment regime.
Sowore said, “Oshiomhole was never an activist. You can check this out anywhere. In 1992, Oshiomhole and one Pascal Bafial, a former NLC President, had a deal with Babangida to increase fuel price, and supported it.
“I did a press conference where we named him as an enemy of students because of what he did when they first started the whole fuel price increase, Oshiomhole was part of it.
“Oshiomhole was never part of the pro-democracy movement. He was one of the few labour leaders during the Abacha’s time who was living in Abuja when all the activists had run away from this country.
“I have said this several times, what Oshiomhole was doing at the period we are describing was what we call organised outrage.”
Speaking further, Sowore said that during the time of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, Oshiomhole would meet Obasanjo and ask him to increase the fuel price, saying, “We will fight small and you will bring it back to where it is supposed to be. You are happy, I’m happy. That was what Oshiomhole was doing.”
He said, “He can challenge me that I said this. In fact, when Abiola’s election was annulled, part of the places the students invaded was the NLC secretariat in Yaba because they were in bed with the military, Pascal Bafial and Oshiomhole were the labour leaders.
“He has been doing labour leadership for a long time. They were the part of the Labour movement that sold out. Frank Kokori who was in PENGASAN were the original people in labour who really shut down the country and they were arrested and kept in detention.”
Sowore questioned, “Why did nobody arrest and detain Oshiomhole? Even me was going in and out of DSS detention at that time. If they detained him, it must have been an arranged detention.”
Reminded of when Oshiomhole was tear-gassed during former President Obasanjo, Sowore said, “That is why I said organized outrage. You can arrange for the police to tear-gas you, but we are talking about a serious fight against the military.”
Sowore added that Oshiomhole was never the most prominent labour leader in Nigeria, noting that the most prominent labour leader in Nigeria was Pa Michael Imodu, who was one of the people first in Nigerian history to be restricted to a city, Auchi, in Edo State, by the colonial masters.
He said that another person was Obafemi Awolowo who was restricted to Lekki located after Dangote Refinery and himself who was restricted to Abuja for three years.
“When you are talking about real labour leaders, don’t mention Oshiomhole. It is a secret within our circles that everybody knows Oshiomhole to be ‘Agaracha’ labour leader.”