Says Gambo not whistleblower but violated service rules and deserves to be disciplined

Soni Daniel – Abuja

The management of Nigeria Bulk Electricity Trading Plc has approached the Appeal Court to set aside the judgment of the National Industrial Court of Nigeria, which recently ordered the company to pay its former head of audit, Gambo Abdullahi,  his two years of salaries after being suspended from work for rejecting redeployment to another department.

The NICN presided over by Justice Oyewumi, had on March 11, 2020, delivered judgment in a suit filed by Sambo Abdullahi, praying the court to direct the company to pay him his two years’ salaries and allowances since the company does not have the power to discipline or transfer him to another department without the board.

In the judgment, the judge held that the management was wrong to have suspended the salaries of the former head of audit before being subjecting him to a disciplinary committee.

ALSO READ: COVID-19: ExxonMobil to cancel two projects in Nigeria, others worth $16 million

However, NBET has filed a stay of execution of the judgment notice with the NICN and an appeal with the Appeal Court asking the appellate court to reverse the judgment of the lower court since it substantially erred in law and denied it fair hearing.

The electricity trading company in a brief filed by its lawyers from Babalakin and Company, contended that the NICN discarded the crucial issue of jurisdiction it raised and went ahead to hear and determine the case without determining whether it had the jurisdiction to do so or not.

In the case it filed at the Appeal Court on March 19, 2020, NBET is particularly contending that the suit filed by Sambo Abdullahi at the NICN had become statute-barred having commenced it against the company more than three months after the alleged action by the company, and that he could not have been above the powers and functions of the company while working as a staff.

The company said that if the judgment of the NICN was allowed to stand it would make other staff of NBET to embark on unimaginable level of lawlessness and wanton indiscipline since the judgment makes it appear as if the company does not have the power to transfer, discipline and control its staff.

It also contended that by ordering the company to pay Sambo Abdullahi, its former head of audit, his salaries for the period he inexplicably absented himself from work and fragrantly seized the audit stamps and safe, the ruling would have emboldened the workers to revolt against the management.

I will be recalled that Gambo Abdullahi, who was the pioneer head of Audit of NBET was transferred to head a newly-established Leading and Development Academy of NBET when the company acquired a Self Accounting Status in 2017 but he refused to move to the new department, slamming the management for the action, which he claimed only the board had the power to do so.

Abdullahi, who has been designated by some civil society bodies as ‘whistleblower’, however declined to appear before the disciplinary committee raised by NBET to hear his case but went to the industrial court to challenge his suspension and stoppage of salary.

No date has been set for the hearing of the appeal due to the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic which has forced all courts to go on break.

Vanguard