The Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) said its compulsory contribution to the Treasury Single Account (TSA) has prevented it from paying N1.8 billion worth of severance packages to the former staff of the Skypower Aviation Handling Company Limited (SAHCOL) as agreed with their unions in 2018.
The revelation is contained in a letter signed by BPE’s Director of Post Transaction Management Mr Taibudeen Oduniyi. The letter was addressed to the General Secretary of the National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE), Comrade Ocheme Aba as seen by by Nairametrics.
Note that the BPE had on November 2nd, 2018, agreed to pay the severance package to 982 former staff of SAHCOL. But the Federal Government’s policy, which requires all agencies, departments, and ministries (MDAs) to remit all revenue to the TSA, made it impossible to implement the agreement.
Efforts to Pay the Severance Package failed: According to the letter, the BPE had written the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning (MFB&NP) for funds to settle the retrenched workers, but without success. The letter reads in part:
- “In the light of the foregoing, it has become expedient to update you on our modest efforts to bridge the communication gap from the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) we signed with you on November 2, 2018, to the setting up of the Negotiating Committee and our Director-General‘s willingness to offer to pay the redundancy as opposed to the stand of the Chairman of SAHCOL. It is evident that if we have the resources, this would have been a forgone issue.
- “Also recall that at the inception of this administration in 2015, all funds of government agencies and MDAs were swept into the Treasury Single Account (TSA), thus disabling us financially. Given this scenario, our only option was to write to the Minister of Finance, Budget, and National Planning for funds to settle you, which we did via our memo on May 19, 2022.
- “We have employed several persons to assist and our last being a visit to one of the Directors with the office of the Accountant-General of the Federation on Friday 7, 2022. We are not relenting and any support from your end will be highly appreciated.”
Former employees of SAHCOL are agitated: The BPE said it has appealed to the former staff to be patient and understanding as the agency works to resolve the matter. However, there are strong indications that the workers may cause industrial unrest in the sector any moment soon. The workers were retrenched in 2010 by the new owners of SAHCOL,
One of the former workers who didn’t want his name in print told our correspondent that they were already mobilizing their members through the industry unions to conduct a protest in the sector in November. The former workers said:
- “We have waited enough. We were laid off in 2010. We have taken all the steps to ensure that we were paid as agreed, but unfortunately, we are yet to be paid.
- “The BPE in 2018, after agreeing that we were entitled to several packages, promised to pay us, but four years after this, we are yet to get anything from the bureau. They are even asking us to assist them in getting the money out of the Ministry of Finance. How can we do that when we are not the government?”
The Acquisition of SAHCOL: SAHCOL was acquired by the Sifax Group in 2009 and renamed Skyway Aviation Handling Company (SAHCO) Plc. The company was subsequently listed on the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) in 2020. Before its privatization, SAHCOL was an arm of the defunct national carrier, Nigeria Airways.
After failing to comply with the 2016 judgment of the National Industrial Court, the court on June 7, 2022, reached an agreement with the BPE on how the redundancy packages should be paid to the beneficiaries.
The former staff of the ground handling company had 2021 petitioned the National Assembly and the Ministry of Aviation over an alleged N1.8 billion severance benefit due to them from the handling company.
The ex-workers in a protest letter to the two institutions alleged that the amount of money was what was calculated by the BPE when the former SAHCOL was acquired by Sifax Groups in 2009.
