NUPRC Workers Stage Protest Over Non-remittance Of Pension Deductions

Workers of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), on Tuesday, staged a peaceful protest at the commission’s headquarters in Abuja, accusing the management of the Commission of non-remittance of their pension deductions, poor working environment, insufficient working tools, as well as non-payment of outstanding claims for staff medicals.

The workers consequently issued a 24-hour ultimatum over their pension deductions and other demands, threatening to pull out from terminals across the country if the management of the commission fails to address issues affecting their welfare within next 24 hours.

The workers, who are members of PENGASSAN, also accused the NUPRC management of non-payment of outstanding 2023 upfront allowances, unpaid staff on-call allowances, and nonpayment of outsourced personnel, among other welfare issues.

Branch chairman of the workers union, Comrade Okechukwu Anya, while speaking with journalists during the protest, condemned the non-remittance of pension deductions, adding that the action was an outright contravention of the Pension Reform Act (2014) which stipulates that monthly pension contributions should be remitted not later than seven days.

Anya, who accused the NUPRC Management of outright disregard in resolving the lingering issues, regretted that all attempts to draw the management’s attention to the workers’ plights fell on deaf ears.

The workers displayed placards with different inscriptions like ‘We cannot be working with our monies and not get a refund’, ‘You have deducted our our pensions and refused to remit to the PFA’, ‘Pay support staff 7 months salaries’, and ‘Stop selling our future’, amongst other grievances.

According to Anya, “We have been engaging them since January. We have written a series of letters, held physical meetings both officially and unofficially and we’ve been met with a paucity of funds. Every time we throw up these issues, we are told there is no fund but we know what is happening in the system.

“We know how they are awarding contracts and inflating these contracts. We know how money is being expended on unnecessary legal cases and spending huge sums of money on issues that are not supposed to be prioritized over staff welfare and that is why we are registering our concerns.”

The workers chairman insisted the workers will be pulled out from the terminals if nothing is done to address the issues raised.

“We will pull our staff out of the terminals with immediate effect. We have our staff waiting at the terminals waiting for the next line of action. We are putting management on notice, if they do not quickly comply with our demands and our welfare, we will pull out our staff with immediate effect,” he declared.

He added: “We have engaged our management for so long on topical issues that affect the staff and all our complaints have fallen on deaf ears and that is why we have resorted today to take to peaceful protest to register our grievances.”