By our reporter 9.10.2026
Federal Capital Territory (FCT), minister Nyesom Wike, is threatening to stop the salaries of teachers who embarked on a strike action on Monday.
According to Mr. Wike the action is being engineered by the FCT chapter of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) leadership in a bid to politically blackmail the government.
“We want to state categorically and let it be known to the public that this so-called strike declaration is political, and we will not accept it.
“We will not accept it because there’s no basis for anybody to call for a strike.
“We don’t have any issue with anybody, either be it area council local education primary authority, or be it secondary schools, we have no issues,” Wike after a meeting with FCT council chairmen on Friday.
According to the minister the FCT Administration has fulfilled all obligations to local government workers and teachers, rendering the industrial action entirely baseless.
He said that major educational unions, including the Senior Secondary School Teachers and the Universal Basic Education Board (UBEB), have dissociated themselves from the strike because current agreements are already being executed.
According to Wike the FCT NLC chairman, Stephen Knabayi, was a candidate for the African Democratic Congress (ADC) in the last Area Council elections.
“And you can see his interest in trying to see that FCT is in crisis, and then wants to use it as a political tool that FCT teachers are at home, and nobody is teaching students; how can you now come and vote for a government when the pupils are at home? “We cannot accept that blackmail. We won’t accept it. I have told everybody, and I have told Labour, look, if you want to involve yourself in politics, you are free to, but then excuse yourself from the leadership of the union, so you don’t politicise it”.