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The idea of united unions and a general strike appeared long ago. Now it's in Nigeria. Minimum Wage - Labour Begins Nationwide Strike Thursday Indications emerged, [Monday], that organised labour will, Thursday, commence a nationwide strike to force the Federal Government to announce its figure and ensure the completion of work on the new national minimum wage. Vanguard gathered last night that it was a decision reached by leaders of Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC; Trade Union Congress of Nigeria, TUC, and United Labour Congress of Nigeria, ULC, after an emergency meeting in Lagos. It was gathered that it will be formerly announced in Abuja… Earlier in the day, leaders of United Labour Congress of Nigeria, ULC, urged Nigerians to stockpile foodstuff and other necessities, saying a nationwide strike appeared now inevitable… Teaching Comparative blog entries are indexed. Use the search box to look for country names or concept labels attached to each entry. Just The Facts! 2nd editio...

Journalists are renowned for using the terms government and regime as synonyms. At least one of the editors at The Economist studied comparative government and politics long enough to learn the difference. [Thanks to Paul Fitzpatrick in Texas for pointing this one out.] Mexico’s new president sets out to change his country’s course   But did voters want a new regime or just a new government? [W]hen Andrés Manuel López Obrador declared that he would be the first Mexican president since 1910 to use the [National Palace] as his workplace, he was making a statement that was both political and historical. Mr López Obrador (known as AMLO to Mexicans), who won a landslide victory in a presidential election on July 1st, promises a “fourth transformation”, after those of political independence, Juárez’s assertion of national sovereignty and the revolution in 1910-17. “This is a change of regime, not just of government,” says Lorenzo Meyer, a historian sympathetic to AMLO. Although he doe...

Can the people in Nigeria overcome culture, ethnicity, and economics to become Nigerians? Most news reports about the conflicts between farmers and herders in Nigeria's Middle Belt come from southern sources and seem to describe the herders as evil invaders. This report seems more balanced. Nigerian Herders Face Threat From Farmers Competing for Land Across parts of Nigeria, conflicts that mirror the 20th Century range wars in the American West have broken out between farmers and herdsmen vying for land, leading to bloody battles. In the first six months of this year, these clashes killed an estimated 1,300 people –- six times the number who died in the war with the Islamist extremist group Boko Haram in the same period, the International Crisis Group says. About 300,000 people have been forced from their homes because of violence between farmers and herders, conflicts that are often exacerbated by religion, ethnicity and even the erratic weather patterns that accompany climate ch...

Could earthquakes affect Nigerian politics? Letter from Africa: The link between earth tremors, God and Nigeria's elections In our series of letters from Africa, Nigerian writer and novelist Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani considers why some earth tremors in Nigeria's capital caused such a stir. Sometime in the early hours of 6 September, I was tucked in bed at home in Abuja when, suddenly, a slight trembling seemed to sway the building from side to side… Later that day, frantic phone calls from friends checking to make sure that I was fine made me realise that what had simply been a mild trembling in my area was more tremulous in certain parts of the city… A few days after the earth tremors, which were felt in different parts of Abuja between 5 September and 8 September, the government released a statement to reassure residents that there was nothing to worry about… The National Space and Research Development Agency (NASRDA) assured Abuja residents that there was no cause for alarm...

A possible election in the UK may be scheduled at the time of an election in the USA. British PM Theresa May 'planning snap election' in November British Prime Minister Theresa May is planning an early general election in November to save her leadership and to prevent the collapse of talks with European leaders over Britain's exit from the bloc, according to a report by the Sunday Times newspaper. The report comes just days after EU leaders rejected the Conservative party leader's preferred plan for leaving the EU, the so-called Chequers agreement. Under that plan, the United Kingdom would enter into a free trade area with the European Union, which would have common rules and standards in several major industries, and maintain customs duties regulations but end freedom of movement between EU member states and the UK. EU leaders dismissed the proposals as unworkable at a meeting they attended with May in Salzburg earlier this week. The Sunday Times spoke to two senior ...

An unscheduled election is scheduled in the UK A possible election in the UK at the time of an election in the USA. British PM Theresa May 'planning snap election' in November British Prime Minister Theresa May is planning an early general election in November to save her leadership and to prevent the collapse of talks with European leaders over Britain's exit from the bloc, according to a report by the Sunday Times newspaper. The report comes just days after EU leaders rejected the Conservative party leader's preferred plan for leaving the EU, the so-called Chequers agreement. Under the plan, the United Kingdom would enter into a free trade area with the European Union, which would have common rules and standards in several major industries, and maintain customs duties regulations but end freedom of movement between EU member states and the UK. EU leaders dismissed the proposals as unworkable at a meeting they attended with May in Salzburg earlier this week. The Sun...

If a government office, like the Central Leading Group on Financial and Economic Affairs, has no public address, no website, and no external telephone number, does it exist? Does its leader wield political power? In the case of Yang Wiemin, former head of the Central Leading Group, the answer is yes. Another example of guanxi at work? Do Yang's remarks illuminate a political fault line in the Chinese leadership? Former top Chinese officials call for better protection of human rights and justice for all Former top Chinese finance officials have called for better enforcement of the law and protection of human rights in China at a top forum to mark the 40th anniversary of the country’s market reforms. Yang Addressing the elite Chinese Economists 50 Forum on Sunday, Yang Weimin, who stepped down earlier this year from the secretariat of the Communist Party’s top economic policy panel, said Chinese people now demanded better protection of human rights, rather than just pursuit of econo...