About 10 years after the ports were concessioned to them and they engaged the services of dockworkers as casual workers, terminal operators last week finally gave employment letters to thousands of dockworkers in Nigerian ports.
Shipping Position Daily recalls that, apparently unsatisfied with their casualization and terms of employment, dockworkers in the employment of one of the terminal operators; ENL demonstrated last week at the Apapa port and at the corporate head office of the company.
Confirming the development to one of our correspondent last Friday, President of the Dockworkers Branch of the Maritime Workers Union of Nigeria; Comrade Adewale Adeyanju expressed delight over the decasualisation of the dockworkers.
He said the union has succeeded in ensuring that its members have all been given employment letters from the terminal operators in all the seaports in the country.
A copy of the letter of employment made available to Shipping Position Daily by two stevedoring firms namely: New Cargo Handling Company for Tin Can Island Container Terminal TICT and Tobef Continental Concept Limited for ENL Consortium categorically stated the entitlement of the workers as regards remuneration, wages and disengagement from service, etc.
The letter dated 9th February 2016 and signed by the General Manager , New Cargo Handling Company Limited; Adebayo Wuraola read in part: “Based on the collective bargaining agreement between Seaport Terminal Operators Association of Nigeria (STOAN ) and Maritime Workers Union of Nigeria on revised minimum standards for dock labour industry dated 1st June 2014,you are hereby offered employment as a dockworker in accordance with paragraph 11 thereto”
“As a dockworker, you will be paid wages based on unit and time related bases basis. ”
Speaking with Shipping Position Daily exclusively last week in Lagos shortly after a meeting with members of his branch, Comrade Adeyanju reiterated that gone are the days of working without all their benefits and entitlement , noting that during his tenure, history has been made by ensuring that the workers get all the necessary benefit after retirement.
The dockworkers’ President who was responding to last week’s protest at ENL by some aggrieved members of the union, explained that the workers were misinformed about the terminal operator’s contract agreement with the Federal Government, stressing that all issues surrounding such action have been addressed at a meeting between the union and concessionaire.
Comrade Adeyanju also confirmed that all terminal operators in the nation’s seaports have complied with the union’s demand, by issuing employment letters to the dock workers, adding that the letter included their terminal benefits.
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