NUPENG AND PENGASSAN vs Dangote Face-off : Workers Have Right to a Trade Union and Decent Work
NLC and TUC Must Launch a Serious National Campaign Against Casualisation and Other Indecent Labour Practices
The Socialist Party of Nigeria (SPN) strongly condemns the vicious campaign aimed at criminalising the right of NUPENG and PENGASSAN to organise workers at the Dangote Refinery. This offensive by Dangote Group and its apologists is a deliberate attempt to entrench a slave-like workplace regime where exploitation thrives unchecked, something which has become a permanent feature of Dangote companies, all in the relentless pursuit of private profit.
We reject any impression that the right to unionise should apply only to public sector workers. This is a blatant distortion designed to weaken the collective power of the working class. Across Nigeria, many private sector organisations already recognise workers’ right to union membership. Indeed, many industrial unions have members only from the private sector. Unionisation in private enterprises is not a privilege but a fundamental, internationally recognised right that applies to all workers, irrespective of sector.
We also denounce the poisonous argument that seeks to compare the unionisation struggle at Dangote Refinery with that of university lecturers in private institutions. This cynical comparison aims to confuse the working class and diminish the legitimacy of trade unions in private industries. Likewise, the suggestion that PENGASSAN and NUPENG should “build its own refinery” rather than organise Dangote’s workers is diversionary and mischievous. Trade unions do not exist fundamentally to own or run capitalist industries, their mandate is to defend and advance the collective interests of workers which include, fight for decent wages, safe working conditions, and protection against exploitation.
Equally baseless is a claim that NUPENG and PENGASSAN are responsible for the collapse of Nigeria’s public refineries. The real culprits are the successive capitalist governments and their private collaborators who have looted public resources, mismanaged national assets, and destroyed public enterprises through corruption and negligence. It was through deliberate sabotage, including fraudulent turnaround maintenance projects, which public refineries were run down to justify the rise of private monopolies like Dangote Refinery. The refinery itself was established through massive state support—public subsidies, tax waivers, and concessions—ultimately serving private accumulation rather than public welfare.
The fact that the outrageous price of petrol hasn’t returned to the pre-May 29 level is an indication that the refinery was established not to guarantee an affordable fuel for mass of the working people. It is rather a monument for a profit maximisation and capitalist greed. The SPN condemns the unjust sack of 800 workers by the Dangote Refinery management and demands their immediate reinstatement with full rights to freely join NUPENG, PENGASSAN, or any trade union of their choice. We stand in full solidarity with NUPENG and PENGASSAN in their just struggle to unionise workers at the refinery.
The SPN views the concession by Dangote Refinery to reabsorb the sacked workers into Dangote Group following the strike action by PENGASSAN as an important, though partial, victory for the workers’ movement. It demonstrates that determined and organised resistance can compel even the most powerful capitalist interests to yield. However, the planned redeployment of the workers to other Dangote subsidiaries could deprive them of union membership PENGASSAN or frustrate them in workplaces unrelated to their expertise and industrial orientation. For this reason, SPN insists that this concession must not be misconstrued as a final victory but as a step in a holistic struggle against the anti-labour practices in the entire Dangote Group. Unfortunately, it appears the leaderships of PENGASSAN as well as the NLC and TUC have accepted the fate of the affected workers as eventually determined by Dangote.
This is quite unfortunate as we strongly believe that a total defeat of Dangote’s anti-labour posture would have been possible, if only the broader labour movement, led by the NLC and TUC, had thrown its full weight behind the fight with a 24-hour nationwide strike, backed by mass street protests. However, the fact that Dangote Group actually enjoyed sympathy from a section of the populace in its faceoff with PENGASSAN and NUPENG is a serious indictment on the leadership of the trade union movement in Nigeria. It is a warning to Labour that the ruling class may seek to exploit the understandable frustration of casual and unemployed workers in a struggle to further weaken the trade unions by arguing that union leaders are “privileged” at the expense of poorer workers.
This is only possible due to the leaderships of trade unions not being seen to seriously identify with, or seriously aid, the daily struggles and plights of the vast majority of the working people and youth. For instance, they have not organized or led any serious struggle against the anti-poor policies of the Tinubu government which have had devastating effects on the living standards of the vast majority. These include the removal of fuel subsidy with attendant exorbitant prices of petrol, devaluation of the naira and criminal hikes in school fees at higher institutions.
So, it is easy for the malicious propaganda of Dangote that the struggle of NUPENG and PENGASSAN, whose President also doubles as TUC President, is self-serving to strike a chord with a section of the populace. Besides, the leaderships of industrial unions like Food Unions which are supposed to cover other Dangote companies and also the NLC and TUC over the years have never led a serious campaign or struggle against the entrenched anti-labour practices of Dangote Group. There were instances where workers who wanted to join unions were sacked while trade unions leaders spinelessly looking the other way. This obviously suggests that until the current Dangote refinery face-off, the trade unions leadership had accepted that Dangote Group of Companies a no-go area for trade unions.
The SPN therefore calls on the trade union leaders to have a serious introspection and draw vital lessons from the experience of Dangote refinery struggle and be prepared henceforth to use the platforms of trade unions to consistently fight for the interest workers and other categories of working people and the poor. Specifically, the NLC, TUC and industrial unions must launch a serious nationwide campaign against casualisation, contract staffing, and other indecent labour practices at all companies and other workplaces in the country as part of struggle against attacks on democratic rights and anti-poor capitalist policies.
Bamigboye Abiodun (Abbey Trotsky)
Acting National Chairperson
Chinedu Bosah
National Secretary
E-mail: [email protected]