PENGASSAN rejects planned sales of Shell, ready to embark on strike
The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, PENGASSAN, has rejected the planned sale of Shell, the Nigerian onshore subsidiary of Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited, SPDC.
PENGASSAN’s General Secretary, Lumumba Okugbawa, disclosed this in a statement on Tuesday.
The development came barely a week after Shell agreed to sell its onshore assets to Renaissance, a consortium of five companies based in Nigeria and an international energy group, for up to $2.4 billion.
Reacting to the planned sale of SPDC, PENGASSAN claimed that the group being speculated to buy the company is an assemblage of unknown entities with no proven track record of managing such diverse assets.
To this end, the association has put its members nationwide on strike notice.
PENGASSAN noted that its attention was drawn to the press release announcing the intended sale of Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited (SPDC) onshore assets to the Renaissance group, consisting of ND Western Limited, Aradel Holdings Pic, the Petrolin Group, FIRST Exploration and Petroleum Development Company Limited and the Waltersmith Group.
“Having appraised the situation, reviewed the presentation and carried out preliminary findings, we wish to state as follows: The group is unknown to us, and thus, it’s an assemblage of unknown entities with no proven track record in managing such diverse assets.
“We reject without equivocation all the terms affecting employees that were communicated in the presentation to our members,” PENGASSAN stated.
The association stated further: “One of the companies that made up the assemblage has a history of subjugating workers and subjecting them to untold hardship, as exemplified in the current management of OML 34.
“Another company in the group has a penchant for preventing workers from unionising and thus stiffening their condition of service.
“Any attempt to transfer the assets without resolving issues affecting our members will be met with the stiffest resistance the industry has ever witnessed.
“The group must come clean with its intention(s) and be ready to engage seriously with the Association, not the jamboree that Shell Management is currently engaging in.
“We have communicated to our Shell/SNBO branches not to be distracted but to focus on the CBA negotiation due about a week from now.
“The industry regulator, joint venture asset partners (NNPCL, non-operated asset partners) and other stakeholders are put on notice now.”
