The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has urged the Senate not to stop the ongoing probe on the sale of public enterprises by the Bureau for Public Enterprises BPE.

This call is contained in a press statement signed by the President of NLC, Comrade Abdulwahed Omar, on Friday in Abuja.

According to the president, given the weight of the allegations and the prominence of the individuals behind them, there is a serious lobby at the corridors of power to either stop the probe or jettison it.

He explained that the attempt was aimed at protecting culpable persons in the deals.

“We urge the Senate not to give in to these scandalous pressures no matter where they are coming from.

“Nigerians have a right to know how public assets established with tax payers’ money were sold and the process employed in giving them away,’’ he said.

He said that in the interest of the country and sustainable development, the Senate should not allow political considerations or behind the scene deals to truncate the hearings and its conclusions.

The statement said Nigerians had gone through the route before, where investigations were carried out on serious public issues and the outcome never saw the light of day because of the lack of political will.

“As stakeholders in the privatisation of public enterprises, we are particularly interested in the post-privatisation activities of the affected companies, ’’it stated.

The statement said that questions raised by the privatisation processes included whether the sold enterprises had “done better in terms of production and distribution of wealth in the national economy.

Or if “they created more employment and enhanced delivery of services to the people’’ than was the case before privatisation.”

It, however, said that with the probe, which started with an open mind with a view not to only examine the processes, there should be a room to ascertain the value-added to the national economy by the privatised enterprises.

“We hope that the transformation agenda of the Goodluck Jonathan administration is not all about policy pronouncements but fundamental changes that will move the nation forward in the interest of the people.

“This is a test case that should not be allowed to fritter away on the altar of the greed of a few individuals in our society, ‘’ Omar said.

He said the Senate had responsibility to live up to expectations as an assembly of true representatives of the people and not allow its integrity to be compromised by the greed and selfishness to loot the nation and not contribute to development.