The proposed sale of Shell, the onshore Nigerian division of Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited, or SPDC, has been rejected by the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, or PENGASSAN.
This was revealed in a statement released on Tuesday by Lumumba Okugbawa, the general secretary of PENGASSAN.
The announcement was made just one week after Shell had previously consented to sell Renaissance, a partnership of five Nigerian businesses and an international energy company, its onshore assets for a maximum price of $2.4 billion.
In response to the news of SPDC’s impending sale, PENGASSAN asserted that the group rumored to acquire the business is a collection of unidentified companies without any track record of successfully managing such a wide range of assets.
In order to do this, the association has issued a nationwide strike notice to its members.
PENGASSAN stated that it was alerted to the press release that announced the planned sale of the onshore assets of Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited (SPDC) to the Renaissance group, which is made up of the Waltersmith Group, ND Western Limited, Aradel Holdings Pic, the Petrolin Group, and FIRST Exploration and Petroleum Development Company Limited.
After evaluating the circumstances, examining the presentation, and conducting initial research, we would like to announce the following: We are not familiar with the group, therefore it is an assortment of unidentified entities without any track record of successfully managing such a wide range of assets.
“We categorically reject all terms pertaining to employees that were conveyed to our members in the presentation,” PENGASSAN declared.
The association continued, saying, “The current management of OML 34 is an example of how one of the companies that made up the assemblage has a history of subjugating workers and subjecting them to untold hardship.”
“One of the group companies has a tendency to restrict workers from forming a union, which results in tightening their terms of employment.”
“The industry will witness the strongest resistance to any attempt to transfer the assets without resolving issues affecting our members.”
“The organization needs to be transparent about its intention(s) and prepared to have genuine discussions with the Association, not Shell Management, as is now the case.
“We have instructed our Shell/SNBO branches to concentrate on the CBA negotiation, which is due in approximately one week, rather than becoming sidetracked.”
“This puts other stakeholders, the industry regulator, and joint venture asset partners (NNPCL, non-operated asset partners) on notice.”
Earlier, NewsVEO reported Nigeria’s support of the sale of the facilities by Shell PLC.