NNPC unbundling must be reversed, says PENGASSAN

NNPC unbundling must be reversed, says PENGASSAN

Wednesday, March 9, 2016 6:14 pm


Francis Johnson: NNPC unbundling illegal

Francis Johnson: NNPC unbundling illegal

The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) on Wednesday described the unbundling of the Nigerian National petroleum Corporation (NNPC) as illegal, insisting on due process.

Mr Francis Johnson, the National President of PENGASSAN, said this while reacting to the unbundling of NNPC in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos.

The oil workers unions on Wednesday shut down the operations of NNPC and its subsidiaries nationwide.

Johnson said that the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr Ibe Kachwuchu, ought to have ensured that the unbundling was properly legislated and deliberated on by all stakeholders.

He said that the unions – the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and PENGASSAN were not carried along in the decision to split the company.

“The minister did it single handily, stakeholders, National Assembly, workers and operators were not carried along in the process.
The process has to be reversed to follow due process before anything can be done on the unbundling or else all NNPC outlets nationwide will remain shut.

“That is the position of the unions,’’ he said,

Johnson, therefore, appealed to President Muhammadu Buhari to urgently reverse the order.

He said the unbundling would `stave off` investors from the nation’s oil and gas industry at a time when they were most needed.

Johnson also said the process was to “truncate the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) into law.’’

According to him, the NNPC Act of 1977 has many provisions related to the structure and the operations of the corporation.

“There are many issues such as pensions and transfer of the employees which are provided for in the NNPC Act of 1977. What will happen to all these provisions of the law?

“For the government to do anything with the current NNPC, the Act must either be repealed or amended to accommodate the planned restructuring.

“If not done, it will equal to lack of respect for the rule of law on the part of the government,’’ he said.


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