Oil and gas workers in the country have threatened to commence a nationwide strike beginning from January if the Federal Government fails to reverse its plans to privatise the country’s four refineries.
The workers, who staged a peaceful protest at the headquarters of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, demanded the Federal Government to call the minister of petroleum resources, to rescind the decision or face massive fuel scarcity.
The protest, which had over 200 employees in attendance, was organised by the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria and National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas workers.
Speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the protest, the President, PENGASSAN, Babatunde Ogun, said, “We are giving them (government) from now till December 24 to rescind their plan of privatising the refineries. We will allow travellers to be able to move from one destination to the other till the end of the year.
“Failure to retract the statement on planned privatisation will lead to a nationwide strike beginning from the first week of January 2014. We hope they reverse the plan as failure will result to complete grounding of activities in the sector.”
The petroleum minister, Diesani Allison-Madueke, had announced that the Federal Government was working hard to complete the privatisation of the four refineries before the end of the first quarter of next year.