NNPC: Contract Teachers Lament Unpaid Salaries

Contract Teachers of NNPC Lament Unpaid Salaries!

A group of contract teachers of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Academy in Kaduna, Warri and Lagos have lamented unpaid salaries. Thus calling on the management of the institution to pay them their outstanding salaries.

The teachers disclosed that they had been battled challenges as a result of being unable to get their salaries.

While some of the contract teachers revealed that they stopped paying them salaries since March 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic began to afflict the country, a member said she was being owed 21 months’ salaries.

According to source, the contract teachers, 12 in number, were employed through various contractors in Kaduna, Lagos and Warri.

The teachers, who pleaded anonymity, revealed that they had been harassed by their landlords on several occasions for their inabilities to pay rents.

One of the teachers had said, “In one of the branches, if you count up to March of this year, it is going to be two years that we have been owed. But what the organisation (NNPC Leadership Academy) is telling the contractors is that their (contractors) services were terminated in March last year.

“However, we (teachers) were still rendering services to them. If you have terminated the contracts of contractors, you did not tell us to go. There was no letter issued to us; they (NNPC Leadership Academy) only issued letters of termination of appointment to the contractors.

“Our own contractor did not even communicate with us on this issue. I think the communication was with our head. When we began to do the online class and we discovered that no money was coming and we were using our data, we had to stop.

“It was around October 2020 or thereabout that we were called and told that the services of our contractors had been stopped. We were surprised and asked why it took them so long to communicate this to us.”

Also, another teacher from the Kaduna branch of NNPC Leadership Academy informed that some of them had worked for 11 years with the organisation and wondered why their salaries were withheld without the necessary communication.

“I was surprised and asked them why they did not inform us earlier in March so that we would know what to do. The contractor is saying they will not pay beyond March, but we are saying we worked till October.

“Some of us have worked for up to 11 years and above. How can they push us out now? Where are we going to find work now? How can they ask us to stop without paying us,” he queried.

The owner of Service Sector Nigeria Limited Director, Mr. Adekunle Yusuf, one of the contractors that employed some of the teachers on behalf of NLA, said he was also affected by the ugly development.

He said, “It is about 10-month salaries that are outstanding. As I speak to you, major bodies in this whole scenario have to see to their obligations. The major bodies are under NNPC/LMA.

“I have been able to pay them for about 12 months. The contractor should be able to sustain six months payment, but I can tell you that I have gone beyond six. I take loans from the bank to be able to sustain this. To date, nothing has come from the Department; it has been different stories.

When reached, the Facility Manager of NLA, Mr. Hamis Joshua, said the contractor should speak on the matter. He said that the NNPC does not have direct contact with the teachers.

“It is up to the contractors. The teachers are third party and not NNPC staff. So, we don’t have direct contact with them. The contract has expired since March 2020 and they have no contract again,” he stated.