By VICTOR AHIUMA-YOUNG & KUNLE KALEJAYE
THE Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, NUPENG, has called on the Federal government to speed up the process of the promulgation of the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, to save the nation’s oil and gas sector from total collapse.

The President of NUPENG, Mr. Aches Igwe, said in Lagos that the union was worried about the many versions of the PIB in circulation, which he said, posed a great challenge to the oil and gas sector.

He said, “PIB is also posing a big challenge because there are various versions of the bill in the National Assembly. The PIB will save the industry from collapse because the industry has practically stopped growing and there is no development, the only thing we can do to tame this issue is to make sure that the PIB is passed.”

He faulted the slow pace by which the committee set up to review the various versions of the PIB and come up with a document that will be acceptable to Nigerians is doing its work and urged members to respond to the yearnings of Nigerians and do the right thing.

Criticising the attitude of the special committee set up to look into the PIB, Igwe said, “They are not coming out publicly to tell Nigerians what they are doing and I believe that the job of the committee is not to do their job in secrecy to the detriment of Nigerians, the oil and gas sector, the nation and the workers of the sector as well. If the committee is do its job effectively, we will see transparency in the issue of the PIB and it will be brought to the public for us to look at the document, criticize it where we need to, and within a short period, the PIB will be passed.”

Lamenting the increasing job insecurity in the sector, he said that redundancy and other forms of job losses in the sector now occur on regular basis.

He said, “In other countries of the world, they make sure that their jobs are well protected, but in Nigeria, the reverse is the case, where we see investors come into this country and one morning they will say that they want to sack everyone in the company. It is our responsibility to protect our jobs, but if the government cannot come and protect our jobs for us then we must rise and protect these jobs ourselves.”

He also warned that If the House report on the subsidy probe was not implemented, NUPENG would react, saying, “In our usual manner in this country, good reports will be made and before you know what is happening the report will be swept under the carpet. But this time around, we hope and believe that the government will sit up and take up the challenge of this issue of corruption in the oil subsidy probe.”