Topic: SHELL SACKS 1800 WORKERS!!!

Shell sacks 1,800 workers in Nigeria


www.chinaview.cn 2009-03-11 20:04:06 Print

Special Report: Global Financial Crisis


LAGOS, March 11 (Xinhua) -- The Anglo-Dutch oil firm, Shell Petroleum Development Company on Tuesday sacked some 1,800 workers in Nigeria owing to declining activity by the oil major in the Niger Delta region, according to the Punch newspaper Wednesday.

The affected workers were issued disengagement letters in the early hours of Tuesday in Delta, Rivers, Lagos and Abuja offices of the oil multinational in Nigeria.

It was gathered that 500 permanent workers, known in Shell parlance as payroll staff and 1,300 casual staff, addressed as peripheral staff, were relieved of their jobs.

The latest development in SPDC occurred less than six months after about 3,000 employees of the company were sacked in similar circumstances in 2008.

It will be recalled that the management of the leading oil major in the country has embarked on cost cutting measures in response to the unending criminality in the Niger Delta, which hasled to drastic reduction in crude oil production by the oil firm.

Already, the oil firm has declared force majeure on crude oil shipments at Bonny Export Terminal in southeast River State and Forcados Terminal in Delta State.

The staff reduction was one of the strategies adopted by the management of SPDC to enable the company stay afloat in the wake of the unending threat to its operations in the restive region.

Tony Okonedo, SPDC's Media Manager, said he was unable to confirm the number of the workers affected in the Tuesday's retrenchment exercise, adding that the workers' fate was not connected with the situation in the Niger Delta region.

Okonedo said it was not the tradition of SPDC to comment on the fate of individual workers, noting that such matter was considered as confidential.

"Some staff may have been recently released by the company but there is no general or re-organization now and it has no bearing with the situation in the Niger Delta region as being suggested in media reports," Okonedo added.

Well, every good thing has its shortcoming. What else do we expect from the dramatic reduction of crude oil prices from around $145 to $45 per barrel. This is just the beginning. I expect a similar actions from the banking industry in the next few months- I am no prophet.
Tunde