PENGASSAN Seeks Increase in Workers’ Salary 

.PenCoN urges Osifo to continue struggles for welfare of retired oil workers

Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja and Sylvester Idowu in Warri

The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) has asked companies in the oil and gas sector to undertake urgent review of salaries of their workers in view of the prevailing harsh economic conditions in the country.

Also, the pensioners of Chevron Nigeria, under the aegis PenCoN, have lauded the President of PENGASSAN, Comrade Festus Osifo and his executive on their unrelenting efforts toward addressing pension abnormalities faced by retired workers in the oil and gas industry.

The association also appealed to the federal government to take necessary measures to check banditry and terrorist activities in parts of the country.

PENGASSAN President, Osifo who addressed journalists shortly after the National Executive Council meeting of the association in Abuja, said that though a lot of success has been recorded in negotiating salary reviews for its members, there are still organisations that have failed to lift their workers from the present harsh economic situation.

He said within this period, PENGASSAN has signed numerous Collective Bargaining Agreements (CBAs) which has brought smiles to the faces of its teeming members.

“This is because we recognise that our job, literally, is how to protect the job of our members, and how to enhance their pay,” he said.

Osifo said that operators in the oil and gas sectors always go for the best qualified professionals to carry out their operations.

“So, the same way they recruit the best, we also challenge them to provide the best condition of service and provide the best remuneration.

“Yes, today, a lot of companies will have achieved successes, but there are still few that we are still discussing at their CBAs, that we are not yet there.

“We still use this opportunity to call on these companies that are still food dragging, that are still holding back, even with the massive devaluation that has occurred in our country, that still don’t want to fix the remuneration of our members.

“We are calling on them to do the needful, because for us in PENGASSAN we will push without holding back. We will push, using everything in our arsenal, to ensure that the needful is done,” he said.

Osifo spoke of the dispute with the Dangote Refinery group, saying there are still pending issues to be resolved.

“Gentlemen of the press, during the networking session, we also looked at the issues that are plaguing some of our branches, and you know that recently, we had some challenges in Dangote Refinery and PetroChemicals Ltd.

“And within this period, since our last National Industrial Action, we have been engaging them in a lot of conversations, but the issues are not fully resolved. There are still a lot of pending issues.

“Yes, the NEC decided that, yes, let us still consummate that process by pushing those issues, by engaging in dialogue to resolve the issues, and by also engaging all our social partners and stakeholders to get the issues resolved,” he said.

The PENGASSAN president said that the meeting also deliberated on security situation in the country .

“We are all seeing how insecurity has been plaguing our land, how this particular challenge has exacerbated in the last few weeks.

“Yes, we just received that a new Minister of Defence will be sworn-in, maybe in the next few hours or thereabouts. But beyond changing personnel, beyond bringing in one personnel to replace the other, which we value so much because we strongly believe in human capital, but the government, both at the federal, at the state, and at the local level, should do everything possible to curb this madness.

“We have had several, when they tell us that they know the sponsors of these terrorists, the question is, where are the sponsors? Why haven’t you named these sponsors?

“Why haven’t you exposed these sponsors? Why haven’t you gone after them? Take them to the locals and get them convicted to serve as deterrents to others.

“We are tired of always having one minute of silence for our brothers and our sisters. We are tired of always coming up to keep condemning and condemning and condemning,” he said.

Osifo said that PENGASSAN is urging the federal government to deploy more funds where necessary to buy sophisticated equipment to go after these terrorists to stop their atrocities.

PenCon, in a statement signed by its President, Comrade Omare J.A and Secretary, Dr. Uche Obiajulu and issued to journalists in Warri yesterday, while expressing appreciation to Osifo and his Central Working Committee said the commendation became necessary following Osifo’s relentless efforts for a better welfare for retired oil workers and for the recent seminar at Abuja convened by PENGASSAN with the theme: ‘Oil and Gas Pensioners’ Future’.

PenCoN reiterated that the President of PENGASSAN has been a pillar to oil and gas retirees following his presentations during the seminar, noting “the ugly fate of retired oil and gas workers in present day Nigeria.” It urged him not to relent in his bid for a better deal and secured pension for retired oil workers.

It urged the PENGASSAN chairman to facilitate the release of the communique of the seminar in Abuja.

The group re-amplified the terrible situation of misery, undeserved pains meted on its members after their meritorious service to Chevron leading to early death of PenCon members.

It recalled that the woes of pensioners began when some of the IOC’s took advantage of the loopholes in Nigeria laws to pauperise retired oil workers who laboured for them.

The group noted that veteran leaders of PENGASSAN and NUPENG negotiated for retirees in their annual CBA negotiation, ensuring that the five per cent annual cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) and 75 per cent of what PENGASSAN and NUPENG added to monthly salary extended to retirees and was institutionalised in every CBA in the upstream sector.

“However all these were unilaterally removed and pensions were placed under IOC full discretion,” it added.

The pensioners further lamented that Chevron successfully stripped her retirees of all benefits, accusing Chevron Nigeria to have hijacked Pension administration after it took over from Gulf Oil Company in 1991 and made Pension strictly its discretion.

PenCon stated that Chevron Nigeria first masterminded the registration of a limited liability company instead of an incorporated Trustee body, and was christened Chevron Retirees Association of Nigeria (CRAN) and introduced it as a union to all retirees.

It explained that the wrong legal framework made it quite impossible for (CRAN) to hold any meeting to represent retirees or resist any unfair policy.

PenCoN therefore urged PENGASSAN president to go a step further to direct BECs to immediately engage their retirees’ association and work closely with them in engaging their various managements to ensure that the overall welfare of retirees were incorporated into their respective CBAs as well as making available to PenCoN.