Daily Independent Online.
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Monday, June 28, 2004.
PENGASSAN demands probe of N112b refinery contract
• Crisis rocks NUPENG, as scribe resigns
By Chuks Isiwu,
Energy
Editor (Lagos)
and Segun Adeleye
Reporter
(Abeokuta)
A mixed fortune was
the lot of the two main trade unions in the oil industry at the weekend. One
stood on its two feet to challenge Abuja over contracts, the other barely
grappled to keep its house in order.
The Petroleum and
Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) called for a probe
into the $800 million (N112 billion) allegedly spent in turning around the four
refineries between 1999 and 2003. This, in its view, is the only way to restore
sanity to the oil sector.
But an internal crisis
rocking its sister organisation, the National Union of Petroleum and Natural
Gas Workers (NUPENG) - the oil sector junior industrial union - claimed
its General Secretary Joseph Akinlaja who has been forced to abdicate his
position.
PENGASSAN Deputy
National President Babatunde Ogun said the probe of the Turn Around Maintenance
(TAM) contract would restore the confidence of Nigerians in the government.
He spoke at the 9th
alumni luncheon of the Moshood Abiola Polytechnic (MAPOLY), Abeokuta at the
weekend, stressing that importation of petroleum products as a stop gap measure
should be time-bound.
Besides, he accused
the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) and Petroleum Products Price
Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) and other government agencies of shirking their
primary responsibility.
These agencies,
according to him, are only meant to protect the consumers from product hazards
and not to fix prices of the products.
Accusing government of
insincerity of purpose, Ogun asked why the Petroleum Equalisation Fund (PEF) is
still being kept despite deregulation.
In the crisis rocking
NUPENG, Akinlaja was said to have voluntarily resigned, but sources maintained
that his resignation came after it was imminent he would be forced out by the
union’s National Executive Council (NEC) if he had insisted on staying
put.
He tendered his letter
of resignation last Wednesday to the NEC meeting in Benin, which reportedly
accepted it. It will, however, take effect from June 30.
Akinlaja, also
National Vice President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), had been pitched
in battle with the NEC, which accused him of compromising on the interests of
the union and its members as well as in undermining the decisions of NEC,
especially as it concerned his alleged use of Lagos tanker drivers to challenge
the decisions of the NEC on important national issues.
Said one of the
sources: “What led to this is a situation where the general secretary was
carrying on as if he was operating outside the union. The matter came to a head
when he began to use tanker drivers in Lagos to oppose our NEC. Because of his
influence, the tanker drivers in Lagos were no longer abiding by decisions of
NEC”.
Akinlaja had
purportedly also been at war with NUPENG President Peter Akpatason and the
Zonal Secretary of the Petroleum Tanker Drivers (PTD), Najeem Korodo, who he
(Akinlaja) was alleged to have removed from office and replaced with his
brother Adekunle Akinlaja.
Prior to last
week’s meeting, the sources said, representatives of the 150 branches of
the union had at an earlier meeting last year, also in Benin, asked that
Akinlaja be sanctioned for his “politics of compromising on
issues“, following which the NEC voted put him on ‘sabbatical
leave’.
Another meeting in
December last year in Kaduna overwhelmingly voted for his removal. Of the 20
members present, 15 voted for it, according to the sources, who claimed that it
was this decision the NEC was about to carry out last week in Benin before
Akinlaja decided to resign voluntarily; having to jump before his was pushed.
