₦airaland Forum

Oludiary:
Statement of Events
I was working with an elevator company as an Elevator Technician when I came to Nigeria. A few months later, I received a message on LinkedIn from a man who wanted to establish an elevator company. He told me he needed me to help build the company and serve as the Lead Elevator Engineer. I agreed to the offer, resigned from my previous employment, and joined his company.
A few weeks after I resumed, I noticed that the man began involving me in some of his other businesses, including his paper business and other activities unrelated to elevator engineering. I did not initially complain, but this began affecting my career and the work I was employed to do.

I also observed how he treated some of his other employees. On several occasions, I witnessed him verbally harassing and physically mistreating staff, including slapping them.

Regarding my own employment, the man has little or no technical knowledge of elevator engineering. Whenever I made professional recommendations or raised concerns about technical decisions, he often rejected them. However, when the consequences of those decisions occurred, he would blame me heavily and make me feel as though I was incompetent or did not know what I was doing.

The major incident occurred on a Friday. After completing our normal schedule for the day, I planned to repair the company's generator because I knew we had a very demanding schedule on Monday and I wanted to ensure that the generator was functioning properly beforehand.

The man repeatedly ordered me to return to the office. I politely explained to him, "Sir, if we don't fix this generator now, it could delay us on Monday." Despite my explanation, he continued insisting that I return to the office. Based on the previous circumstances and my assessment of the situation, I refused to immediately leave the generator.

He then came out of his vehicle and approached me aggressively, appearing as though he wanted to physically assault me. I tried to move away from him to avoid a confrontation. However, he grabbed my clothing and pulled it forcefully, causing one of my buttons to come off.

There were police officers present at the scene. He ordered them to put me into his vehicle, but they refused after witnessing what had happened. He then called other police officers on patrol, who subsequently arrested me.

At the police station, he made several allegations against me, including an allegation that I was the person who assaulted him. I was detained from Friday until Monday. During this period, he allegedly gave money to the police officers. My mother eventually came to the station on Monday and secured my release.

I was told that he would only allow me to be released on the condition that I sign an undertaking stating that I would continue working for him. I was under significant pressure and had already spent several days in detention, so I agreed to sign the undertaking in order to secure my release.

Immediately after I signed the undertaking, his treatment of me became worse. At the end of the month, he deducted two days' pay from my salary. I asked him why the money had been deducted because, to the best of my knowledge, I had not missed those two working days. He told me that the deduction was for the days I had spent in police detention.

I became upset about this and returned to the police station to report the matter. However, the police were unable to recover the money for me.

I subsequently informed him that if he expected me to continue working for him, I wanted my salary to be paid weekly, with my monthly salary divided into four payments. He refused this arrangement. Since then, I have not resumed work.

I now believe that because the undertaking did not prevent me from stopping work, he has decided to pursue an assault case against me. I have now been invited to the police station tomorrow in connection with the alleged assault.

I maintain that I did not assault him. I attempted to avoid a physical confrontation when he approached me aggressively, and he was the person who grabbed my clothing and pulled it.

I am concerned about what may happen at the police station tommorow and would like proper legal advice and protection regarding my rights, the alleged assault case, the undertaking I signed under pressure, my unpaid/deducted wages, and the circumstances surrounding my previous detention.

You are too soft. If this story is true, let him come and try that nonsense with me. I will make sure they either demote those police officers or sack them. Secondly, I will shut the man's business down.

Wishing him recovery. People in the medicals, pls make una dey confirm well well before una declare people dead. It's easy for you to quickly declare because no be una blood.