Faith Kel.com

Culled from The Punch

Scarcity of petroleum products looms across the country as the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers threatens to embark on a nationwide strike with effect from Wednesday when a 72-hour deadline issued to the Federal Government expires.

The General Secretary of NUPENG, Mr. Elijah Okougbo, said in a communiqué  issued by the union in Abuja on Sunday that the impending strike had to do with disagreement over loan obtained by Jetty and Petroleum Tank Farm Owners Association of Nigeria from some banks, to satisfy the demand for fuel importation.

It was learnt that NUPENG was demanding the implementation of a section of an agreement reached with the Federal Government to allow JEPTFON, a subsidiary association, to pay back the loan in 15 years with three percent interest.

He said the Federal Government had ignored implementations of both demands contained in the agreement reached with the union.

The NUPENG general secretary said the union was compelled to issue the ultimatum because the banks were mounting serious pressure on JEPTFON to repay the loan in spite of the agreement reached with the Federal Government.

Okougbo said NUPENG would not give any further notice to the Federal Government before proceeding on the nationwide industrial action.

He said member associations of the union had been compelled to embark on a drastic reduction of their workforce in the drive to repay the outstanding loan stressing that MRS, one of its members sacked 100 workers because of the loan issue.

He said since the 72 -hour ultimatum was issued to the Federal Government, the union had not received a response from the government apart from the State Security Service which advised them against it because of the prevailing security situation in the country.

He recalled that the union had made other efforts to call the attention of government agencies to their plight without success.

He said, letters written to the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, the Minister of Labour and Productivity, the Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, the National Security Adviser, the Executive Secretary of the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency and other critical offices on January 10, 2012,  did not yield any result.

He said, “If nothing is done to consider the satisfactory implementation of the committee reports, we will have no choice but to resume our suspended nationwide strike without further notice in order to save the livelihood of our members as injury to one, is injury to all.”