News

Mr Festus Osifo, President of PENGASSAN, made the call on Thursday in Abuja at the ongoing 2026 PENGASSAN Labour Summit, themed “Strengthening Regulatory Frameworks as a Catalyst for Stability and Growth.”

Osifo said effective stakeholder engagement was critical to developing strategies capable of moving Nigeria’s oil and gas industry toward sustainable stability and growth.

“It is clear that for us to move the industry forward and develop a synopsis that can lead us from where we are today to greater heights tomorrow, there must be collaboration among stakeholders.

“There must be collaboration between government, regulators, employers and labour, because this synergy is what will bring about stability in the industry,” he said.

He said no stakeholder could independently address the industry’s challenges, stressing that coordinated efforts were necessary to promote sustainable development and industrial harmony.

Osifo said PENGASSAN had consulted past leaders and former union officials to draw lessons from previous experiences and improve its approach to emerging industry challenges.

He said the association was initially apprehensive about divestments but engaged its past leaders to understand previous experiences and develop strategies for protecting workers during the process.

According to him, PENGASSAN subsequently engaged the Nigerian Upstream Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) to ensure workers’ interests were incorporated into the divestment framework.

He said the union insisted that acquiring companies demonstrate how they would protect jobs, sustain remuneration and improve workers’ welfare after taking over divested assets.

“We insisted that those buying the assets must tell us how they would protect the jobs of our members and sustain or improve their remuneration over time,” he said.

Osifo said the framework required agreements among divesting companies, acquiring firms and PENGASSAN before final transactions, particularly those involving operated assets, could be concluded.

He said the arrangement helped protect workers during divestments involving major International Oil Companies, adding that no PENGASSAN member lost employment during the process.

The PENGASSAN president said the union also secured commitments from acquiring companies to maintain and improve workers’ welfare packages following the transfer of operations.

He said labour-management negotiations should be based on dialogue and reliable data, rather than allowing disagreements to escalate into industrial disputes and prolonged agitation.

Osifo said experience had shown that employers often offered improved conditions after industrial action, when similar concessions could have been achieved earlier through constructive negotiations.

“Our advice to management and labour is that whenever we have negotiations, both sides should remain open, listen and review the data before allowing agitation,” Osifo said.

He said PENGASSAN remained committed to reasonable demands and preferred dialogue and evidence-based negotiations whenever workers’ legitimate interests could be addressed peacefully.

Osifo also urged oil companies to prioritise workers’ training, describing continuous capacity development as essential to improving competence, productivity and workplace safety.

He expressed concern that some indigenous oil companies regarded training as an unnecessary expense and reduced training budgets whenever management sought to cut operational costs.

“Training is not just another cost; it is a necessary cost because it gives employees the tools required to discharge the work they were employed to do,” he said.

Osifo said inadequate training could contribute to workplace incidents, particularly in the oil and gas industry, where employees operate in hazardous and technically demanding environments.

He urged managers to provide adequate training and retraining, stressing that workers needed the requisite skills to perform their duties safely and return home to their families.

“We want our members to be trained so that when they go to work, they can discharge their functions and go back home safely to their families,” Osifo said.

He said effective collaboration, constructive negotiations and sustained investment in workers’ capacity would contribute to stability, productivity and sustainable growth in Nigeria’s oil and gas industry.(NAN)