Oil Union: We'll Force Oil Companies To Close If They Hurt Protestors

In a statement likely to be followed by strikes, Nigeria's leading union today said it would force oil companies that use force to repel invaders to close down.

The threat by PENGASSAN, the nation's most powerful union, came after Nigerian security forced deployed to protect a ChevronTexaco refinery in the Niger Delata town of Warri shot several invading protestors to death as about 500 youths overran its facilties and did an estimated $500 million in damage to pumps, equipment and pipeline controls.

The threat was carried in the Nigerian daily Vanguard Wednesday morning.

The paper reported, in part:

Induce policemen to attack workers and be closed down, PENGASSAN warns oil companies
by Victor Ahiuma-Young
Wednesday, February 9, 2005

LAGOS -- Worried by the increasing alleged managements\ expatriates induced armed police attacks on oil workers in Nigeria, Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) has threatened to close down any oil company whose management\expatriate staff induces armed policemen to harass or attack workers henceforth.

President of PENGASSAN, Dr. Brown Ogbeifun told Vanguard in an interview that besides that, such expatriate staff would be forced to leave Nigeria and lamented that if the Nigerian government refuses to protect its citizens, the citizens would protect themselves.

He said: "What is responsible for using mobile policemen, indeed other security agencies, to harass workers is corruption. Take the issue of WASCO that just happened at Port Harcourt where an expatriate will tell you that, ‘I can pay the security agencies in this nation and that I can do anything’. The man will just pick up his phone and call the police, the policemen are there at the man’s will. So, what do you think is responsible? Of course, corruption. This is the only country I see, or have seen in my life that the security agencies that are supposed to protect the people are being used by expatriates to harass, intimidate and attack the indigenes. It does not happen in other parts of the world. Can a Nigerian just go to America and use their police to harass Americans? It is not possible. You cannot do it in the United Kingdom.

But it is happening in Nigeria. The only thing that is responsible for this is that he who pays the piper dictates the tunes. If not, we cannot see it happen. But I am sure that the issue of WASCO will equally teach some companies a lesson.

A situation where you call people ‘Aseholes’ and fools and then you just pick up phone and call the police, and they are rushing there to harass, intimidate and attack union leaders and workers, I think those days are gone. One, we shall resist the harassment, intimidation, arrest and attacks. Two, the affected company will be closed down. Three, the expatiates will leave this country. If the government is not ready to protect us. We shall protect ourselves. That is the level we have reached".

The threat is yet another indication that foreign oil investments in Nigeria are becoming untenable. Increasing violence over the past two years has seen majors like Royal Dutch/Shell, ChevronTexaco, ExxonMobil and others face seizures of their oilfields, demands that they buy decrepit state-owned refineries and refine all their Nigerian output in-country, multibillion-dollar fines, and pressure to build huge and costly plants to process natural gas. The latest demands include hiring of indigenous employees to replace foreign oil workers.

At the same time, incessant departures from deadlines and delays in the second licensing round of the Nigeria-Sao Tome and Principe Joint Development Zone have outraged, angered and frustrated overseas investors, who see unprofessional conduct by the nation's de facto petroleum minister, Dr. Edmund Daukoru, and warring politicians at all levels of government as inimical to new investment in the troubled, hyper-nationalistic country.