C pickets Union Bank today over staff welfare.Bank assures of uninterrupted services
Monday, 14 February 2011 05:07 Francis Okeke, Christiana T. Alabi, Kaduna& Mohammed Shosanya, Lagos
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NLC President Omar

Nigeria labour Congress (NLC) said it will today shut down Union Bank of Nigeria (UBN) Plc for sacking bankers’ union and refusing to recognise the umbrella union.


The Group Managing Director of Union Bank of Nigeria Plc, Mrs Funke Osibodu had last month written a letter, stating that the bank it would no longer recognise the Association of Senior Staff of Banks, Insurance and Financial Institutions (ASSBIFI), claiming that it was an illegal body.


But the president of the NLC, Comrade Abdulwahed Omar in a statement, entitled, “Funke Asibodu’s declaration of war: NLC is equal to the task” said the NLC rejects the bank’s position and is fully aware of the “anti union antics” of Mrs Funke Osibodu.

Omar added that, “To signal her war against congress, Mrs Osibodu ordered that union dues deducted from salaries of the bank’s workers be remitted to them. This order has already been expeditiously carried out. We see all these actions and utterances as open declarations of war against Nigeria workers in general and the NLC in particular. We wish to therefore call on all affiliates of congress, our allies in the civil society and the entire Nigerian workers that the leadership of congress is ready to enforce the mandate given to it at its National Executive Council (NEC) meeting of Friday, February 4, 2011, where NEC resolved that workers picket the national headquarters of Union Bank and its branches across the country as from 8am on Monday, February 10, 2011.

“While Mrs Osibodu has boasted that she had deployed soldiers to guard all its branches across the country and ordered them to shoot-at-sight any worker who comes for picketing, congress wishes to state that we are ready to confront and if possible die rather than watch the management of Union Bank condemn its workers to second slavery through vagrant abuse of their rights to freedom of association as enshrined in the Nigerian constitution, the Trade Union Act 2005 and ILO conventions 87 and 88 of which Nigeria is a signatory. The shutdown will be in all the branches of the bank nationwide with the Abuja shutdown kicking off at 7: 00 am, from the NLC’s headquarters in the Central Business District, where workers will gather and proceed to branches of the bank in the city,” the NLC said.

In accordance to this order, the NLC in Kaduna has informed the general public that all branches of the bank in the state would be shut down with effect from today.

According to a statement jointly signed by the vice chairman and secretary of the council, Adamu Ango and Henry Shekarau, all affiliates of NLC in the state have been asked to participate in the picketing exercise.

Meanwhile, the Union Bank of Nigeria Plc has assured that there would be no disruption of its service in all its branches nationwide today.

The bank in a statement yesterday, said, “Union Bank of Nigeria Plc staff wish to assure all our numerous and highly esteemed customers and the general public at large, that there will be no disruption of it service in all our branches nationwide, including the head office.

We use this opportunity to give assurance of improved and continued service delivery in Union Bank of Nigeria Plc. This press release is in response to the concerns of our highly esteemed customers nationwide with respect to Industrial Relations issues in our great bank and we thank our valued customers for their loyalty and patronage over the years’, the statement said.