The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) has threatened to picket the Dangote Petroleum Refinery following the alleged dismissal of about 800 Nigerian workers who recently joined the union.
According to PENGASSAN, the refinery replaced the sacked Nigerians with over 2,000 Indian expatriates, a move the association described as discriminatory and unlawful.
General Secretary of PENGASSAN, Lumumba Okugbawa, accused the refinery of targeting workers for unionising despite a directive from the Federal Government supporting their membership. He said the dismissals coincided with the workers’ completion of their union registration process.
“Over 800 workers agreed to join the union. The next thing we saw was a letter firing all Nigerian staff, while over 2,000 expatriates from India were retained,” Okugbawa alleged.
The union warned that it would deploy all legal and constitutional means, including protests and picketing, if the refinery fails to reinstate the affected workers.
In response, the refinery denied the allegations, insisting that the dismissals were part of a “necessary reorganisation” prompted by repeated acts of sabotage that raised safety concerns.
“Only a very small number of staff were affected. Over 3,000 Nigerians continue to work actively in our refinery, and we are still recruiting through our graduate trainee and experienced hire programmes,” the company said in a statement.
Dangote Refinery further stressed that it respects international labour principles and supports workers’ rights to unionise, adding that the measures taken were to protect the facility as a “strategic national asset.”
The dispute comes weeks after members of the Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) temporarily shut down operations at the refinery over claims of anti-union practices, a situation later halted by a court injunction.
PENGASSAN has scheduled an emergency National Executive Council meeting to decide on the next line of action.
