Striking Nigerian Oil Workers to Shut Oil and Gas Installations

A three day warning strike called by Nigeria’s Trade Union Congress and the Nigeria Labor Congress is reverberating throughout the country’s energy sector, its primary source of foreign revenue.

Responding to the TUC and NLC calls for strike actions, the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers and Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) has called on its members show solidarity and shutter all oil and gas installations and plants throughout the country.

The industrial action comes in the wake of the refusal of federal and state governments to implement the new minimum wage, The Daily Trust reported.

PENGASSAN president Babatunde Ogun told reporters, "Government at all levels and the private sector must implement the minimum wage law and pay the wages as provided by the law. It is a law and it must be obeyed by employers in both the public sector and the private sector. For the government not to obey the law, it must first repeal it. And in the process of repealing the law, the government must first repeal all laws that govern payment of salaries, allowances and other emoluments to all political office holders, judiciary and others earning jumbo pay in the country. Drastic downward review of their emoluments is a prerequisite to any discussion on ability to pay or not."

By. Charles Kennedy, Deputy Editor OilPrice.com