Service disruption looms as telecom workers embark on strike

The Private Telecommunications and Communications Senior Staff Association (PTECSSAN) has commenced a seven-day strike over what it described as ‘precarious working conditions’.

In a statement to TheCable, the association said the strike, which started on Monday, will not be suspended until its demands are met.

The industrial action may impact the operations of telcos as it involves field workers such as maintenance engineers, transmission engineers, customer service engineers, fibre optics engineers, riggers, and other key staff in the telecoms sector.

“The strike action has become inevitable because of the prevalent precarious working conditions our members are enduring in the sector, the refusal of the employers to recognise and respect the constitutional right of these workers to freely associate with the union and the unjust sack of 3 members of the union,” the PTECSSAN said.

“We shall not be suspending the planned indefinite strike action until our demands, which are as follows, are met: immediate reinstatement of the three unjustly sacked workers; Sotola Sunday Kolawole, Ulu Ikechukwu Christopher and Alex Franklin C.

“Immediate recognition of the fundamental right of the employees to freely associate with the union, recognition of the union as negotiating body for the employees on workers welfare.

“Remittance of membership dues into the union’s account as earlier provided, recognition of the years of service of these workers, commencement of appropriate pensions deduction and remittance of same as required by the Pension Act.

“Approval of the national health insurance scheme that covers the employees, their spouses and four of their dependents; enrolment of union members in the Group Life Insurance as stipulated in the Pension Reform Act 2004, Section 9(3).

“Immediate implementation of leave and leave allowance in accordance with the international best practices, negotiation on review of salaries of the workers to meet the economic reality in the country today.

“Immediate provision [of] operational vehicles or in the alternative immediate negotiation on review of the self drive/self rental to meet the economic reality in the country today and stoppage of 24-hour job and introduction of work hours in accordance to the international best practices.”

Other demands include an end to work overload (combining additional passive tasks with existing duties) and adherence to occupational health and safety standards in line with global best practices.

“We hope that these companies will utilise the 7-day window of this notice to meet our demands and avert the indefinite strike action,” the group said.

“The following are the culpable companies: Huawei Technologies Nigeria Limited, Tylium Nigeria Limited, Specific Tool & Techniques, CPNL, CITCC, Jus Partners Cosmopolitan Ltd, WTES Projects Ltd, Treblem Engineering Service, Prec Pearl Ltd.

“Telesuprecon Ltd, Allstream Energy, Safari Group Ltd, Optical Networks Infrastructure Ltd, TOPVEG, TNL Networks, IT Support, Force-Com Integrated Technology, DMCL, Reime, Multisquare Technology, Maxychi Global Communications Limited, BJ Bison.

“Winmax Ltd, Waase, Uppercrest Ltd, Timeless, Telenoetica, Suharim Investment, Phase, OneData, Nanocom, Monola Ltd, Introspect Ltd, Galaxy, FiberOne Broadband, Edge Infra, Cedarview Communications and Bitmap Technologies.”

‘IMPLICATIONS OF STRIKE WILL BE SEVERE’

Okonu Abdullahi, the union’s secretary-general, said the association workers play a significant role in maintaining essential infrastructure, including base stations for companies like IHS and Huawei.

Abdullahi said the implications of the strike will be massive because members have been told “not to respond to any service outage from our employers”.

“The fact remains that there are outages every day, and if our engineers do not respond to those outages, subscribers in those areas will be affected,” he said.

The secretary-general said the association had given the companies numerous opportunities to address their demands but they chose to ignore them.

Abdullahi warned that if their concerns continue to be disregarded, the union would be compelled to take more drastic actions.