Unemployment
By Chinyere Bassey
Lagos, July 12, 2018 (NAN) Workers in the oil and gas sector on Thursday decried the increasing number in indecent employment in Nigeria, as it was killing career growth and development.
The workers under the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN), said this at the end of the meeting of the two organisations in Lagos.
Mr Francis Johnson, PENGASSAN President, condemned the level of unemployment in the country, saying that even where there was employment, the jobs had become more or less slave labour.
“In almost all multinational oil companies in Nigeria, there are no more direct permanent jobs for the middle level to lower level cadre.
“It has become a bigger challenge of increased violent crimes and suicidal migrations,’’ he said.
Johnson called on the government to make it mandatory for every oil and gas company to employ not less than 50 per cent of its employees of middle to junior cadre as direct permanent workers.
He said it was regrettable that the Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment was not strict in compliance with extant labour laws because of poor understanding of the contract processing and workings in the industry.
He said that lack of compliance with extant law has increased impunity and anti-labour tendencies of most indigenous and multinational oil companies operating in the country.
Mr William Akporeha, NUPENG President, who spoke on insecurity said that the incessant killings and destruction of lives and properties, especially farm lands was a threat to food security.
According to Akporeha, high insecurity level was increasing hunger and poverty and poses as threat to foreign direct investment as international investors misconstrue Nigeria as an unsafe investment destination.
He called on the Federal Government and the affected state governments to work together to reinvigorate and overhaul their security system.
“As socially responsible stakeholders who believe in sanctity of human life, we appeal to government at all levels to empower all security agencies with the right resources.
“We want security personnel to concentrate more on surveillance, intelligence gathering and intelligence processing with the right technology and equipment,’’ he said.
On the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB), the union leader commended the National Assembly for the passage of PIB and also urged the executive arm of government to give speedy assent to it before the 2019 electoral process. (NAN)
CHIN/IFY
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Edited by Ify Omowole