70 ex-Mobil workers protest unpaid severance benefits 10 years after the sack

Some aggrieved members of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association (PENGASSAN) have protested the non-payment of their severance benefits by the Mobil Producing Nigeria 10 years after they were sacked by the company.

The disengaged workers, 70 in number, said that they were disengaged in 2009 before the expiration of their employment contracts at the Qua Iboe Oil Export Terminal operated by the MPN and were denied their entitlement of N600 million.

They said it took the management of MPN nine years to authorize payment of their terminal benefits in 2018 but said that the amount fell short of the computed benefits by over N600 million.

A former chairman of Contract Workers Branch of the PENGASSAN in MPN, Mr Peter Akpenka, said in an interview in Yenagoa on Monday that more than five of the owed workers had died in frustration.

Alpena said the plight of the workers was worsened by the insensitive posture of MPN and the nonchalant attitude of PENGASSAN officials who allegedly connived to work against the collective interest of the affected workers.

He said, “Even more worrisome is the role being played by members of our union who generated an obnoxious document and donated same to MPN management to justify the release of over N600 million due to our members.

“We have asked why PENGASSAN will donate the salaries and terminal benefits of its members to Mobil and got no answers, we have forwarded our cases but the union has not acted.

“We were locked out while our employment contract was still running and under our labour laws, when there is such a breach of an existing contract, the terminal benefits reflect and compensate for the breach.

“It took them nine years to pay part of the benefits in 2018 and they are still holding on to the balance, and we are at a loss as to why our own union is working against us.

“Rather than use the subsisting Collecting Bargaining Agreement as at the time of our disengagement in August 2009 to compute our benefits, they connived and used an old discarded template and hence the shortfall.

“We have communicated them several times in writing, written reminders while this matter lingered over the years and they have taken no action.

“Our position is that MPN, an affiliate of ExxonMobil should not accept the donation of our benefits and declare the same as profit. We urge MPN management to correct the anomaly and ensure their labour contractors pay us.”

A letter dated Nov 15, 2017, signed by Mr Rotimi Olubeko, MPN’s Area Procurement Manager addressed to Managing Director, Sigmund Engineering Works, confirmed that the contracts of the oil workers were terminated in 2009.

MPN in the letter authorised the labour contractor to pay the severance package which the aggrieved workers complained fell short of the subsisting Collective Bargaining Agreements as of the time of their disengagement in 2009.

Mr Mathew Oloche of Sigmund, one of the labour contractors retained by MPN at the Qua Iboe Oil Export Terminal, explained that Sigmund was merely an intermediary between MPN and its contract staff.

He said, “We have just one case of the 2009 disengagement and his entitlements were worked out in line with MPN Human Resources Policy and he was paid and it is well documented.

“We in Sigmund are not owing him a kobo, if however the case he is making for additional payment materializes and MPN agrees to pay, we shall not stand in the way,” Oloche said.

Another labour contractor, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the labour contractors were not involved in the computation of terminal benefits as they were only mandated to pay what MPN authorized.

The contractor said that MPN management and PENGASSAN had set up a verification committee to determine the amount payable to the disengaged workers, adding that the committee should be held responsible for any shortfall.

Reacting to the allegations by the aggrieved members, the General Secretary of PENGASSAN, Mr Lumumba Okugbawa, said the union tried its best under the prevailing circumstances but denied that the union abandoned its members.

He said, “It is not true that we abandoned our best, their sack in 2009 was a major challenge to the union and across the industry. The development even affected the willingness of other operators to allow contract staff to join the union.

“We tried our best in getting the issue resolved and that was a long time ago some 11 years down the line, we did what we could under the prevailing situations and circumstances.

“At one hand, we wanted contract staffers to be unionized as a basis of stemming casualisation in the oil sector but the Contract Workers branch of PENGASSAN got diverted when they demanded parity with permanent staff.

“They are our members and rather than criticise the union openly they should exhaust internal mechanisms to resolve the conflict by going back to their local branches of PENGASSAN, the union is still there.”