Oil
workers unions on Wednesday shut down the operations of Nigerian National
petroleum Corporation (NNPC) nationwide. The unions are Nigeria Union of
Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and Petroleum Natural Gas Senior
Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN).
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that workers at the
NNPC headquarters in Abuja were stopped from entering their offices. Attempt to
get the union leaders to speak proved abortive as they all declined to speak to
the media. One of the NNPC staff, who spoke to the NAN on condition of
anonymity, said the union shut the office claiming that they were not consulted
on the process of unbundling of the corporation. “
We heard that our leaders are in a meeting and they will brief
us by 4 p.m,’’ she said NAN reports that there was police presence and most of
the workers were seen sitting outside the towers awaiting directives from the
union leaders. It would be recalled that NUPENG and PENGASSAN in separate
statements on Tuesday said the move to unbundle the corporation was an attempt
to provoke the oil and gas workers and cause industrial unrest in the country.
“We condemn the unilateral action of the Minister of State, Dr
Ibe Kachikwu, as the decision is not in consonance with the laws establishing
the NNPC. “The unbundling and rebranding of NNPC as announced by the Minister
of State is another public policy change which is not consistent with the Act
and Laws establishing NNPC and will be resisted by oil and gas workers in the
country.
“ NUPENG will not tolerate a situation whereby the unbundled companies will now
hide under the cover to start disengaging its workers,’’ it said NAN also
reports that Kachikwu on Tuesday announced that President Muhammadu Buhari had
approved the unbundling of the corporation into four units. The units were
Upstream Company, Downstream Company, Refinery Company, Gas and Power Company.
According to him, the Upstream Company will now comprise NPDC
and the IDSL, while the Downstream Company consists of Retail, NPMC and NPSC,
The Refinery Company, he said, would consist of WRPC, KRPC and PHRC, while the
Gas and Power is now made up of NGPTC, NGMC and Gas and Power Investment.
Kachikwu said the Federal Government had approved the
appointment of Chief Executives for the companies in person of Bello Rabiu as
Chief Executive Officer of the Upstream Company. Others are: Henry Ikem Obih
for Downstream; Anibor Kragha for Refineries and Saidu Mohammed for Gas and
Power.
Mr Ohi Alegbe, Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division
of NNPC, confirmed that the protesting workers also denied him entry into his
office. He said that when the management of the corporation met, it would
comment on the development.(NAN)
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