A National Industrial Court, sitting in Lagos, has nullified the Lagos State government’s appointment of a Caretaker Committee, known as Parks and Garages Administrators, and reinstated the operations of the Road Transport Employers Association of Nigeria, RTEAN, in the state.
Trial judge, Justice Maureen Esowe, made the declaration while delivering judgment in a suit by RTEAN against the state government and other defendants.
Lagos State government had dissolved RTEAN, suspended its operations and taken over the garages.
The judge held that the act of the Lagos State in suspending the National union’s operations in the state and setting up a caretaker committee was illegal and against the provisions of Sections 4 (1), (2)& (3), and 5 (1) &(3), read along with item 34 of the exclusive legislative list, of the 1999 Constitution, as amended.
The judge also held that the government and the Police should have intervened by arresting and prosecuting those behind the fracas and not inquiring into the dispute.
Justice Esowe, meanwhile restrained the Lagos State government from further interfering with the operations of the union’s exco and ordered the police to refrain from intimidating the union’ s officers and to remove all barricades it imposed around their secretariat and to grant them unfettered access to their offices.
Reacting to the judgment, counsel to the Lagos State government and the Parks and Garages Administrators, said they would study the judgment and act accordingly.
