1,000 Staff Sacked By First Bank Stage Protest In Ibadan
Aggrieved contract staff of Whyte Cleon Limited, a subsidiary of First Bank Limited, in their large numbers on Thursday stormed major streets in Ibadan, Oyo State, to protest against their sudden disengagement from the service of the bank .
The disengaged workers, said to be about one thousand, were drawn from all the branches of the first generation bank in the state, also displayed placards to express their grievances and betrayal from an organisation they claimed to have laboured for with all their lives.
The protesters, who were at the Correspondents’ Chapel office of the Nigerian Union of journalists (NUJ), Mokola, Ibadan, said that they were engaging in the protest on behalf of the over 1,000 of their colleagues that have suffered similar fate.
Addressing a press conference earlier at the Correspondents Chapel, the group said that many of the disengaged workers had served the organization for not less than nine years, adding that instead of rewarding them with full employment status, the organization decided to disengage them with a short message service (SMS) without any benefit, which they said was unacceptable.
The spokesperson of the group, Mr. Aleem Waheed, insisted that they were not engaged by Whyte Cleon Limited, but by Insourcing Limited, a subsidiary and Human Resourcing arm of First Bank and that they worked and were being paid by First Bank Limited.
Some of the placards read: ‘No To Modern Slavery By First Bank’, ‘Pay Us Our Nine Years’ Benefit’, ‘@First Bank Nig, If U Must Sack, Pay Entitlements’, ‘FirstBank Engages In Modern Slavery’, ‘Pay Your Support Staff Their Entitlements After 9 Years’, ‘Our Mumu Don Do’, ‘Firstbank, Pay My 9 Years’ Entitlement’, ‘FBN = In-Sourcing = Whyte Cleon, Stop Slavery’, ‘First Bank, Exploiting Staff Since 1894’, among others.
He stressed that the disengaged staff with varying years of service ranging from between seven to nine years served the bank with all diligence as none of them was sacked based on incompetence or misconduct.
He added that “all through our years of service in the bank, many anomalies had been ongoing. For instance, they don’t pay us some bonuses and allowances which were being enjoyed by full fledged staff of the organization despite the fact that some of us dubbed contract staff have better qualification and years of experience than some of the full fledged staff.”
Waheed, flanked by some other aggrieved protesters noted that many of them had served the company without complaints, despite being in the know of many anomalies, some of which he listed to include, Pay For Performance (PFP), Up Front, Relocation Allowance, Millage Claim (travel allowance for training), amongst others.
According to them, the knowledge that the employer had no career plan for the staff was obvious when their employer started disengaging them with SMS without compensation or anything to fall back on, which was against the rule of engagement of any corporate and reputable organization.
“No formal letter of disengagement was issued to the workers, as at the time they were told to hand over all bank belongings in their custody and stop reporting for work”, he lamented.
A copy of the text which was made available to reporters read, “Dear Colleague, this is to inform you that you are here recalled to Whyte Cleon Limited effective September 8, 2017. Kindly submit all bank’s property in your custody, including handover note, ID card, token and other documents to your BM/HBS/Supervisor effective Monday, 11th September, 2017. You are no longer expected to report to your current location.
“For further directives, call the number of the officer overseeing your region as indicated below: North Jumai Adams (08091052850), South-South Olalekan Atoyebi (08187078518), West Onoriode Aramogbo (08023417968). Thank you”.