The Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) has described Senator Adams Oshiomole as an enemy of Nigerian workers.
Oshiomole, a former President of the Nigerian Labour Congress, NLC, received the brush on account of his recent remarks faulting oil workers strike over the sack of 800 workers in the employ of Dangote Refinery.
NUPENG’s National President, Comrade Williams Akporeha, and General Secretary, Comrade Afolabi Olawale, expressed the union’s displeasure in a statement on Monday, saying Oshiomole’s act represents a reprehensible assault on the fundamental rights of Nigerian workers” and a gross distortion of established labour laws.
The union lamented that Oshiomole, who was a former labour leader has now become a vocal advocate for corporate oppression, campaigning against the rights he once fought to protect.
The statement said:”Oshiomhole’s denunciation and insensitivity to the plight of 800 engineers and his resistance to unionism in the petroleum and gas sector is a dangerous toxin designed to weaken the resolve of the working class and strengthen the class
“We will continue to deploy every legal and industrial instrument available to us, in full compliance with Nigerian law and global labour standards, to secure justice.”
The union has also resolved to boycott any event featuring Senator Oshiomole in order to drive home its collective action again him.
“We witness with utter disappointment a former labour leader now transformed into a vocal advocate for corporate oppression, actively campaigning against the very rights he once championed,” the statement read. “His attempts to rationalize the victimization of workers for exercising their fundamental rights of association and peaceful action are not only nauseating but represent a flagrant misrepresentation of Nigerian Labour Law and International Labour Organisation (ILO) Conventions.”
The union emphasized that PENGASSAN’s solidarity action with its members at the Dangote Refinery, where over 800 engineers were sacked for unionizing, is a protected legal action under Section 31 of the Trade Unions Act.”
It added:“The principle that ‘an injury to one is an injury to all’ is the foundational ethic of trade unionism globally.For some Undistinguished Senators to now find this principle inconvenient only reveals a trading of once avowed class consciousness for a place among the oppressors.”
The union cited sections of the 1999 Constitution and relevant labour laws,and reaffirmed that every person in Nigeria: citizens and foreigners alike has the right to freedom of association and assembly,” and that “no employer has the right to interfere with an employee’s freedom to join or form a union.
According to the union, Section 9(6) of the Labour Act forbids any contract that attempts to exclude a worker from trade union membership, while ILO Conventions 87 and 98, both ratified by Nigeria, guarantee workers’ rights to form and join unions without interference.
